
Class "PTT^Q^ o 



POETICAL WOEKS 



JAMES MONTGOMERY. 

WITH A 

ilTemoir of tl)c ;2lutl)or, 

BY 

THE REV. RUFUS W. GRISWOLD. 

IN TWO VOLUMES. 

VOL. I. 



BOSTON: 
PHILLIPS, SAMPSON AND COMPANY. 

185 3. 






Entered according to Act of Congress, In the year 1845, by 

SORIN & BALI,, 

in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. 






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CONTENTS 

OF 

THE FIRST VOLUME. 



PRISON AMUSEMENTS. 

Page 
Verses to a Robin Red-breast, who visits the Window of my Pri- 
son every Day ^" 

Moonlight 20 

The Captive Nightingale ^^ 

Ode to the Evening Star 25 

Soliloquy of a Water-wagtail on the Walls of York Castle . . 28 

The Pleasures of Imprisonment 30 

The Bramin. Extract from Canto 1 39 

The Bramin. Extract from Canto II 40 

A Tale too true ^^ 

THE WANDERER OF SWITZERLAND. 

PartI II 

Part II II 

Part III li 

Part IV. • • ^.^ 

PartV 67 

Part VI ^-^ 

THE WEST INDIES. 

Parti. • l\ 

Part II QQ 

Pan III ,11 

Part IV ^"^ 

THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 

To the Spirit of a Departed Friend ^^^ 

Canto First J^^ 

Canto Second 126 

Canto Third 13'^ 

Canto Fourth 142 

Canto Fifth 151 

Canto Sixth 1^1 

3 



CONTENTS OF VOLUME I. 



Page 

Canto Seventh 169 

Canto Eighth 177 

Canto Ninth 186 

Canto Tenth ... 193 

GREENLAND. 

Canto First 205 

Canto Second 214 

Canto Third • . . 223 

Canton Fourth 235 

Canto Fifth 244 

THE PELICAN ISLAND. 

Canto First 265 

Canto Second 272 

Canto Third 281 

Canto Fourth 289 

Canto Filth 298 

Canto Sixth 304 

Canto Seventh 317 

Canto Eighth 326 

Canto Ninth 332 

THE CHRONICLE OF ANGELS. 

Part 1 349 

Part II 351 

Fart III 354 

SONGS ON THE ABOLITION OF NEGRO SLAVERY, IN 
THE BRITISH COLONIES, AUGUST I, 1834. 

No. L The Rainbow 361 

No. IL The Negro is Free 3G1 

No. III. Slavery that was 362 

No. IV. Slavery that is not 363 

No. V. The Negro's Vigil: Eve of the First of August, 1834 363 

SONNETS, IMITATIONS, AND TRANSLATIONS. 

A Sea Piece. In three Sonnets 365 

Westminster Abbey, on the twenty-eighth of June, 1838 . 366 

Imitation from the Italian of Gaetana Passerini .... 367 
The Oak. Imitated from the Italian of Metastasio . . . 367 
Imitation from the Italian of Giambattista Cotta .... 368 
The Crucifixion. Imitated from the Italian of Crescimbeni . 368 
To a Bride. Imitated from the Italian of P. Salandri . . . 369 



CONTENTS OF VOLUME I. 



Page 
On the Siege of Genoa by the French Army in 16**. Imitated 

from the Italian of Gaetana Passerini 369 

Imitated from the ItaUan of Petrarch 370 

On the Siege of Famagusta, in the Island of Cyprus, by the 

Turks, in 1571. Imitated from the Italian of Benedetto 

Dall'uva 370 

On the Sepulture of Christ. Imitated from the ItaUan of Gabriello 

Fiamma 371 

On Judith Returning to Bethulia with the head of Holofornes 

in her hand. From the Italian of Giovambatista Zappi . 371 
For a Nun, on taking the Veil. From the Italian of Eustachio 

Manfredi 372 

From Petrarch 372 

The Swiss Cowherd's Song, in a Foreign Land. Imitated from 

the French 373 

Meet again 373 

Via Crucis, Via Lucis 374 

German War Song 375 

FROM DANTE. 

Ugolino and Ruggieri 376 

Maestro Adamo 379 

Dante and Beatrice 382 

The River of Life 383 

The Portal of Hell 386 

Anteus 387 

Cain 388 

Farinata 389 

Notes 393 



MEMOIE OF THE AUTHOE. 



James Montgomery is admitted by all the critics to 
be at the head of the rehgious poets of the present age. 
Since the bard of Olney, no one has surpassed him in 
purity of sentiment or fervour of devotion. For half 
a century he has been slowly and constantly increasing 
in the popular favour, and his reputation has now a 
compass and a solidity which forbid all thought of its 
decay. 

Of the throng of competitors among whom he has 
won his laurels, Crabbe, Byron, Southey, Coleridge 
and Campbell have gone before him into the region 
of the Unknown ; and Rogers and Wordsworth, his 
venerable brothers, are permitted with him to linger at 
the gates of the Future and listen to the applauses of 
posterity. They are the noblest impersonations of 
Piety, Philosophy, and Taste, and they are all im- 
mortal. 

In the last and completest edition of his works, pub- 
lished recently in London, Mr. Montgomery has 
given in various prefaces and notes an account of his 

7 



life and writings, from which, and some other mate- 
rials, we prepare this brief biography. 

James Montgomery is the eldest son of a Moravian 
clergyman, and was born at Irvine, in Scotland, on the 
fourth of November, 1771. His parents determined to 
educate him for the ministry, and at a very early age 
placed him in one of the seminaries of their church, 
where he remained ten years. At the end of this 
period he decided not to study the profession to which 
he had been destined, and was, in consequence, placed 
with a shop-keeper in Yorkshire. Ill satisfied with his 
new employment, however, he abandoned it after a 
few months, and, when but sixteen years of age, made 
his first appearance in London, with a manuscript 
volume of poems, of which he vainly endeavoured to 
procure tlie publication. 

In 1792, being then about twenty-one years of age, 
he went to Sheffield, where he was soon after engaged 
as a writer for The Register, a weekly gazette, pub- 
lished by a Mr. Gales; and, in 1794, on the flight of 
his employer from England, to avoid a political prose- 
cution, he himself became publisher and editor, and 
changing the name of the paper to The Iris, conducted 
it, with much taste, ability, and moderation. It was 
still, however, obnoxious to the government, and Mr. 
Montgomery was prosecuted for printing in it a song 
commemorative of the destruction of the Bastile, fined 
twenty pounds, and imprisoned three months in York 
Castle. On resuming his editorial duties, he carefully 
avoided partisan politics, but after a short period he 



MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. 



was arrested for an offensive passage in an account 
which he gave of a riot in Sheffield, and again im- 
prisoned. 

It was during his second confinement that he wrote 
" Prison Amusements," which appeared in 1797. In 
the preface to the first edition, he says, " These pieces 
were composed in bitter moments, amid the horrors of 
a jail, under the pressure of sickness. They were the 
transcripts of melancholy feelings, — the warm effusions 
of a bleeding heart. The writer amused his imagina- 
tion with attiring his sorrows in verse, that, under the 
romantic appearance of fiction, he might sometimes for- 
get that his misfortunes were real." 

Mr. Montgomery returned to his office, and with a 
strong determination, " come wind or sun, come fire or 
water, to do what was right," conducted his paper; 
and his taste, judgment and integrity gradually over- 
came the prejudices which the course of his pre- 
decessor, much more than any thing he had himself 
written, had created against it. 

Referring to this period of his life, he tells us that he 
had "foolishly sacrificed all his friends, connections, 
and prospects in life, and thrown himself headlong into 
the world, with the sole view of acquiring poetic 
laurels." " In the retirement of Fulneck, among the 
Moravian Brethren, by whom I had been educated," 
he continues, " I was nearly as ignorant of the world 
and its every-day concerns, as the gold fishes swimming 
about in the glass globe on the pedestal before us are 
of what we are doinof around them ; and when I took 



MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. 



the rash step of running into the vortex, I was nearly 
as httle prepared for the business of general life as 
they would be to take a part in our proceedings, were 

they to leap out of their element The experience of 

something more than two years had awakened me 
to the unpoetical realities around me, and I was left 
to struggle alone amidst the crowd, without any of 
those inspiring motives left to cheer me, under the 
delusive influence of which I had flung myself amidst 
scenes, and into society, for which I was wholly unfit 
by feeling, taste, habit, or bodily constitution. Thus, 
I came to Sheffield, with all my hopes blighted like the 

leaves and blossoms of a premature spring There 

was yet life, but it was perverse, unnatural life, in my 
mind ; and the renown which I found to be unattain- 
able, at that time, by legitimate poetry, I resolved 
to secure by such means as made many of my contem- 
poraries notorious. I wrote verses in the doggerel 
strain of Peter Pindar, and prose sometimes in imi- 
tation of Fielding and Smollett, and occasionally in the 
strange style of the German plays and romances then in 
vogue. Effort after effort failed. A Providence of 
disappointment shut every door in my face, by which I 
attempted to force my way to a dishonourable fame. I 
was thus happily saved from appearing as the author 
of works which, at this hour, I should have been 
ashamed to acknowledge. Disheartened at length 
with ill success, I gave myself up to indolence 
and apathy, and lost seven years of that part of my 
youth which ought to have been the most active 



MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. 



and profitable, in alternate listlessness and despond- 
ency, using no further exertion in my office affairs 
than was necessary to keep up my credit under heavy 
pecuniary obligations, and gradually, though slowly, 
to liquidate them." 

About the year 1803 he began to write in his better 
vein of seriousness, and a lyric which he published, 
under a nom de plume in The Iris, received such unex- 
pected applauses, that he from that period abjured his 
former eccentricities. One lay after another, in the 
" reformed spirit," appeared in the two following years, 
and he collected the series into a volume, which was 
printed under the title of " The Ocean, and other 
Poems," in 1805. 

In 1798, the independence of Switzerland had been 
virtually destroyed by France, though till 1803 the 
cantons were nominally allowed to exercise home juris- 
diction. In the beginning of the last mentioned year 
Napoleon abolished the government, and declared that 
the cantons must in future be the open frontier of France. 
On the seventeenth of February this circumstance was 
thus recorded by Mr. Montgomery, in The Lis : 

" The heart of Switzerland is broken ; and Liberty 
has been driven from the only sanctuary which she had 
found on the Continent. But the unconquered, the un- 
conquerable offspring of Tell, disdaining to die slaves 
in the land where they were born free, are emigrating 
to America. There, in some region remote and ro- 
mantic, where Solitude has never seen the face of man, 
nor Silence been startled by his voice, since the hour 



MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. 



of creation, may the illustrious exiles find another 
Switzerland, another country rendered dear to them 
by the presence of Liberty. But even there, amidst 
mountains more awful, and forests more sombre than 
his own, when the echoes of the wilderness shall be 
awakened by the enchantment of that song which no 
Swiss in a foreign clime ever hears without fondly 
recalling the land of his nativity, and weeping with 
affection, how will the heart of the exile be wrung with 
home-sickness ! and oh ! what a sickness of heart must 
that be, which arises, not from '■Jwpe deferred^'' but from 
^hope extinguished, — yet remembered.'' " 

A friend, on reading this paragraph, suggested to the 
author that it was a fine subject for a poem ; and with the 
intention of composing a ballad in the style and of the 
length of the well-known fragmentary cento of " The 
Friar of Orders Gray," he immediately commenced what 
grew under his hands to be " The Wanderer of Switzer- 
land." In the year after its publication, when it had 
reached a third edition, it was violently attacked in one 
of those smart but shallow criticisms which gave noto- 
riety to the earlier numbers of the Edinburgh Review. 
It was still, however, successful ; and twenty-eight 
years afterward the Review confesses, against its pro- 
phecy, that our poet has taken a place among the 
classics of the British nation. 

His next work was " The West Indies," which ap- 
peared in 1809, and was designed as a memorial of 
the then recent abolition by the British government of 
the Slave Trade. 



It was followed, in 1812, by " The World before 
the Flood," in four cantos, suggested by an allusion in 
"Paradise Lost"* to the translation of Enoch. This is 
one of Mr. Montgomery's most popular works, and 
has many passages of quiet, reflective beauty, which 
will make perpetual its good reputation. 

" Greenland" appeared in 1819. The subject was 
well suited to his powers and habits of feeling. In the 
region of eternal snows to which the pious Moravians 
bore the gospel. Nature was grand, beautiful, and pe- 
culiar ; and with the zeal, the faith, and the heroism 
of the missionaries, the poet had a perfect sympathy. 
Like " The World before the Flood," it has passages 
of description and reflection w^hich would add to the 
fame of the greatest of bards, and in unity and com- 
pleteness it is superior to any of our author's other 
works. 

In 1822 Mr. Montgomery published his "Songs 

" In other part the sceptred heralds call 
To council, in the city-gates; — anon, 
Gray-headed men and grave, with warriors mix'd, 
Assemble, and harangues are heard ; but soon 
In factious opposition ; till at last 
Of middle age one rising, eminent 
In wise deport, spake much of right and wrong. 
Of justice, of religion, truth and peace, 
And judgment from above. Him old and yoimg 
Exploded, and had seized with violent hands, 
Had not a cloud descending snatch'd him thence, 
Unseen amid the throng ; so violence 
Proceeded, and oppression, and sword-law, 
Through all the plain, and refuge none was found." 



MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. 



of Zion." By many earlier pieces, of a similar kind, 
he had shown that he possessed, in an eminent degree, 
all the qualities of a lyrical poet, and he now took his 
place as a weaver of sacred song on the same elevation 
with Watts and Cowper. His minor poems will, 
hereafter, be most frequently read, and most generally 
admired. They have the antique simplicity of pious 
George Withers, and a natural, unaffected earnest- 
ness, joined to a pure and poetical diction, which will 
secure to them a permanent place in English litera- 
ture. 

Mr. Montgomery has little dramatic power, and 
little skill in narrative. His longest and most elaborate 
works, though they contain beautiful and touching 
thoughts, and descriptions distinguished alike for grace, 
minuteness, and fidelity, are without plot, and are defi- 
cient in incident. His little songs and cabinet pieces, 
however, are almost perfect in their way ; and nearly 
all of them are full of devotion to the Creator, sym- 
pathy with suffering humanity, and a cheerful and 
hopeful philosophy. 

In 1827, Mr. Montgomery gave to the world " The 
Pelican Island," descriptive of the solitary contempla- 
tion of nature. It has the faults of his other long 
poems, but is more graceful and fanciful, and some 
parts of it were declared by the leading reviewers to 
be worthy* of Milton. It is the last of his considerable 
works. 

After a silence of nearly a decade, he published, in 
1835, a " Poet's Portfolio, or Minor Poems," contain- 



MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. 



ing, as he states modestly in his preface, " miscella- 
neous and fugitive pieces, which, with many others, 
had been collecting on his hands during a period when 
no recollection of past success could embolden him to 
attempt greater things." " Speed the Prow," "A Story 
without a Name," and other pieces in this volume, 
show that his energy, his perception of the beautiful, 
his sincere and earnest feelings, and his fine poetical 
expression, had not passed away with the completion of 
his three score years. 

Mr. Montgomery conducted The Iris, until 1825, 
and on his retirement from the editorial profession, 
which he had adorned by his uniform courtesy as well 
as by his integrity and his ability, his friends gave him 
a public dinner at Sheffield, at which Lord Milton 
presided. In reply to a complimentary sentiment, he 
made a speech, in which he reviewed with his cus- 
tomary modesty his literary career. " Success upon 
success, in the course of a few years," he said, 
" crowned my labours, — not indeed with fame and 
fortune, as these were lavished on my greater contem- 
poraries, in comparison with whose magnificent pos- 
sessions on the British Parnassus, my small plot of 
ground is no more than Naboth's vineyard to Ahab's 
kingdom ; but it is my own, it is no copyhold ; I bor- 
rowed it, I leased it, from none. Every foot of it I 
enclose from the common myself; and I can say that 
not an inch which I had once gained have I ever lost. 
I attribute this to no extraordinary power of genius, or 
felicity of talent in the application of such power as I 



MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. 



may possess. The estimate of that I leave to you who 
hear me, not in tJiis moment of generous enthusiasm, 
but when the evening's enjoyment shall come under the 
morning's reflection. The secret of my moderate suc- 
cess, I consider to have been the right direction of my 
abilities to right objects. In following this course I 
have had to contend with many disadvantages, as well 
as resolutely to avoid the most popular and fashionable 
ways to fame. I followed no mighty leader, belonged 
to no school of the poets, pandered to no impure pas- 
sion ; I veiled no vice in delicate disguise, gratified no 
malignant propensity to personal satire; courted no 
powerful patronage ; I wrote neither to suit the man- 
ners, the taste, nor the temper of the age ; but I 
appealed to universal principles, to imperishable affec- 
tions, to primary elements of our common nature, 
found wherever man is found in civilized society ; 
wherever his mind has been raised above barbarian 
ignorance, or his passions purified from brutal selfish- 
ness. 

" I sang of war, — but it was the war of freedom, in 
which death was preferred to chains. I sang the 
Abolition of the Slave Trade, that most glorious decree 
of the British Legislature, at any period since the 

Revolution I sang, likewise, the love of home ; 

its charities, endearments, and relationship ; all that 
makes ' home sweet home ;' the recollection of which, 
when the air of that name was just now played from 
yonder gallery, warmed every heart throughout this 
room into quicker pulsations. I sang the love which 



MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. 



man ought to bear towards his brother, of every 
kindred, and country, and dime upon earth. I sang 
the love of virtue, which elevates man to his true 
standard under heaven ; I sang, too, the love of God, 
who is love. Nor did I sing in vain. I found readers 
and listeners, especially among the young, the fair, and 
the devout; and as youth, beauty and piety will not 
soon cease out of the land, I may expect to be remem- 
bered through another generation at least, if I leave 
any thing behind me worthy of remembrance. I may 
add, that from every part of the British empire, from 
every quarter of the world where our language is 
spoken, — from America, the East and West Indies, from 
New Holland and the South Sea Islands themselves, — 
I have received testimonies of approbation from all 
ranks and degrees of readers, hailing what I had done, 
and cheering me forward. I allude not to criticisms 
and eulogiums from the press, but to voluntary commu- 
nications from unknown correspondents, coming to me 
like voices out of darkness, and giving intimation of 
that which the ear of a poet is always hearkening on- 
ward to catch, — the voice of posterity." 

Mr. Montgomery is still living, beloved for his 
piety and admired for his genius — awaiting calmly and 
trustfully his summons to that better world for which 
he has prepared himself by a life of faith and loving 
obedience. We cannot better conclude this notice, 
nor better express our judgment of his works, than by 
quoting the declaration of the Edinburgh Review, that 
"there is something in all his poetry which makes 

2* 




Fiction the most impressive teacher of truth and 
wisdom, and by which, while the intellect is gratified 
and the imagination roused, the heart, if it retains any 
sensibility to tender or elevating emotions, cannot fail 
to be made better." 

Philadelphia, September, 1845. 



PRISON AMUSEMENTS. 



VERSES TO A ROBIN RED-BREAST, 

WHO VISITS THE WINDOW OF MY PRISON EVERY DAY, 

Welcome, pretty little stranger ! 
Welcome to my lone retreat ! 
Here, secure from every danger, 
Hop about, and chirp, and eat : 
Robin ! how I envy thee, 
Happy child of Liberty ! 
Now, though tyrant Winter, howhng. 

Shakes the world with tempests round. 
Heaven above with vapours scowling. 
Frost imprisons all the ground ; — 
Robin ! what are these to thee ? 
Thou art blest with liberty. 

Though yon fair majestic river* 

Mourns in solid icy chains ; 
Though yon flocks and cattle shiver, 
On the desolated plains ; — 
Robin ! thou art gay and free, 
Happy in thy hberty. 

Hunger never shall distress thee. 

While my cates one crumb afford ; 
Colds nor cramps shall e'er oppress thee ; 
Come and share my humble board : 
Robin ! come and live with me, 
Live — yet still at liberty. 



PRISON AJMUSEMENTS. 



Soon shall Spring in smiles and blushes 

Steal upon the blooming year ; 
Then, amid the enamour'd bushes, 
Thy sweet song shall warble clear ; 
Then shall I, too, join'd with thee. 
Swell the Hymn of Liberty. 

Should some rough unfeeling Dobbin, 

In this iron-hearted age, 
Seize thee on thy nest, my Robin ! 
And confine thee in a cage, 

Then, poor prisoner! think of me, 
Think — and sigh for liberty. 

Feb. 2, 1795. 



MOONLIGHT. 



Gentle Moon ! a captive calls ; 

Gentle Moon ! awake, arise ; 
Gild the prison's sullen walls ; 

Gild the tears that drown his eyes. 

ThroAv thy veil of clouds aside ; 

Let those smiles that light the pole 
Through the liquid ether glide, — 

Glide into the mourner's soul. 

Cheer his melancholy mind ; 

Soothe his sorrows, heal his smart : 
Let thine influence, pure, refined, 

Cool the fever of his heart. 

Chase despondency and care. 

Fiends that haunt the guiltv breast : 
Conscious virtue braves despair ; 

Triumphs most when most oppress'd. 



MOONLIGHT. 



Now I feel thy power benign 

Swell my bosom, thrill my veins ; 

As thy beams the brightest shine 
When the deepest midnight reigns. 

Say, fair shepherdess of night ! 

Who thy starry flock dost lead 
Unto rills of living light, 

On the blue ethereal mead ; 

At this moment, dost thou see, 

From thine elevated sphere. 
One kind friend who thinks of me, — 

Thinks, and drops a feeling tear ? 

On a brilliant beam convey 

This soft whisper to his breast, — 

" Wipe that generous drop away ; 
He for whom it falls is blest. 

" Blest with Freedom unconfined, 
Dungeons cannot hold the Soul : 

Who can chain the immortal Mind ? 
— None but He who spans the pole." 

Fancy, too, the nimble fairy. 

With her subtle magic spell, 
In romantic visions airy 

Steals the captive from his cell. 

\ 
On her moonlight pinions borne. 

Far he flies from grief and pain ; 
Never, never to be torn 

From his friends and home again. 

Stay, thou dear delusion ! stay ; 

Beauteous bubble ! do not break ; 
— Ah ! the pageant flits aAvay ; 

— Who from such a dream would wake ? 

March 7, 1795. 



PRISON AMUSEMENTS. 



THE CAPTIVE NIGHTINGALE. 



Nocturnal Silence reigning-, 

A Nightingale began 
In his cold cage complaining 

Of cruel-hearted Man : 
His drooping pinions shiver'd, 

Like wither'd moss so dry ; 
His heart with anguish quiver'd, 

And sorrow dimm'd his eye. 

His grief in soothing slumbers 

No balmy power could steep ; 
So sweetly flow'd his numbers, 

The music seem'd to weep. 
Unfeeling Sons of Folly ! 

To you the Mourner sung ; 
While tender melancholy 

Inspired his plaintive tongue. 

" Now reigns the moon in splendour 

Amid the heaven serene ; 
A thousand stars attend her, 

And glitter round their queen : 
Sweet hours of inspiration ! 

When I, the still night long. 
Was wont to pour my passion, 

And breathe my soul in Song. 

" But now, delicious season ! 
In vain thy charms invite ; 
Entomb'd in this dire prison, 
I sicken at the sight. 



This morn, this vernal morning, 
The happiest bird was I, 

That hail'd the sun returning, 
Or swam the hquid sky. 

" In yonder breezy bowers. 

Among the foh'age green, 
I spent my tuneful hours 

In sohtude serene : 
There soft Melodia's beauty 

First fired my ravish'd eye ; 
I vow'd eternal duty ; 

She look'd — half kind, half shy ! 

" My plumes with ardour trembling, 

I flutter'd, sigh'd, and sung : 
The fair one, still dissembling, 

Refused to trust my tongue : 
A thousand tricks inventing, 

A thousand arts I tried ; 
Till the SAveet nymph, relenting, 

Confess'd herself my bride. 

" Deep in the grove retiring. 

To choose our secret seat. 
We found an oak aspiring. 

Beneath whose mossy feet. 
Where the tall herbage swelling, 

Had form'd a green alcove, 
We built our humble dweUing, 

And hallow'd it with love. 

" Sweet scene of vanish'd pleasure ! 

This day, this fatal day, 
My little ones, my treasure, 

My spouse, were stolen away ' 
I saw the precious plunder. 

All in a napkin bound ; 



PRISON AMUSEMENTS. 



Then smit with human thunder, 
I flutter'd on the ground ! 

" O Man ! beneath whose vengeance 

All Nature bleeding lies ! 
Who charged thine impious engines 

With lightning from the skies ? 
Ah ! is thy bosom iron ? 

Does it thine heart enchain ? 
As these cold bars environ, 

And', captive, me detain ? 

" Where are my offspring tender ? 

Where is my widow'd mate ? 
— Thou Guardian Moon ! defend her ! 

Ye Stars ! avert their fate ! — 
O'erwhelm'd with kilhng anguish. 

In iron cage, forlorn, 
I see my poor babes languish ; 

I hear their mother mourn ! 

" O Liberty ! inspire me. 

And eagle-strength supply ! 
Thou, Love almighty ! fire me ! 

I'll burst my prison — or die !" 
He sung, and forward bounded ; 

He broke the yielding door ! 
But, with the shock confounded. 

Fell, hfeless, on the floor ! 

Farewell, then, Philomela : 

Poor martyr'd bird ! adieu ! 
There's one, my charming fellow ! 

Who thinks, who feels like you : 
The bard that pens thy story. 

Amidst a prison's gloom, 
Sighs — not for wealth nor glory, 

— But freedom, or thy tomb ! 

Feb. 12, 1796. 



ODE TO THE EVENING STAR. 



ODE TO THE EVENING STAR. 

Hail ! resplendent Evening Star ! 
Brightly beaming from afar ; 
Fairest gem of purest light 
In the diadem of nigl^t. 

Now thy mild and modest ray 
Lights to rest the weary day ; 
While the lustre of thine eye 
Sweetly trembles through the sky ; 
As the closing shadows roll 
Deep and deeper round the pole, 
Lo ! thy kindling legions bright 
Steal insensibly to light ; 
Till, magnificent and clear. 
Shines the spangled hemisphere. 

In these calmly pleasing hours, 
When the soul expands her powers, 
And, on wings of contemplation, 
Ranges round the vast creation ; 
When the mind's immortal eye 
Bounds, with rapture, to the sky, 
And, in one triumphant glance, 
Comprehends the wide expanse, 
W^here stars, and suns, and systems shine, 
Faint beams of majesty divine ; 
— Now, when visionary sleep 
Lulls the world in slumbers deep ; 
When silence, awfully profound, 
Breathes solemn inspiration round ; 
Q,ueen of Beauty ! queen of stars ! 
Smile upon these frowning bars. 
Softly sHding from thy sphere. 
Condescend to visit here. 



26 


PRISON AMUSEMENTS. 




In the circle of this cell, 




No tormenting demons dwell ; 




Round these walls in wild despair, 




No agonizing spectres glare ; 




Here reside no furies gaunt ; 




No tumultuous passions haunt ; 


i 


Fell revenge, nor treachery base ; 




Guilt, Avith bold unblushing face ; 




Pale remorse, within whose breast 




Scorpion-horrors ;nurder rest ; 




Coward malice, hatred dire, 


i 


Lawless rapine, dark desire ; 


i 


Pining envy, frantic ire ; 




Never, never dare intrude 


i 


On this pensive solitude : 




— But a sorely-hunted, deer 


i 


Finds a sad asylum here ; 




One, whose panting sides have been 


! 


Pierced with many an arrow keen ; 




One, whose deeply-wounded heart 


' 


Bears the scars of many a dart. 




In the herd he vainly mingled ; 


i 


From the herd, when harshly singled, 


1 


Too proud to fly, he scorn'd to yield ; 


1 


Too weak to fight, he lost the field ; 




Assail'd, and captive led away. 




He fell a poor, inglorious prey. 


I 


Deign then, gentle Star ! to shed 




Thy soft lustre round mine head ; 




With cheering radiance gild the room, 


j 


And melt the melancholy gloom. 




When I see thee, from thy sphere, 


i 


Trembhng hke a brilliant tear. 


! 


Shed a sympathizing ray 


i 


On the pale expiring day, 


i 


Then a welcome emanation 


i 

i 

j 

1 


Of reviving consolation. 



ODE TO THE EVENING STAR. 



Swifter than the lightning's dart, 

Glances through my glowing heart ; 

Soothes my sorrows, lulls my woes, 

In a soft, serene repose. 

Like the undulating motion 

Of the deep, majestic ocean, 

AVhen the whispering billows glide 

Smooth along the tranquil tide ; 

Calmly thus, prepared, resign'd, 

Swells the independent mind. 

But when through clouds thy beauteous light 

Streams, in splendour, on the night, 

Hope, like thee, my leading star. 

Through the sullen gloom of cate, 

Sheds an animating ray 

On the dark, bewildering way. 

Starting, then, with sweet surprise, 

Tears of transport swell mine eyes ; 

Wildly through each throbbing vein. 

Rapture thrills with pleasing pain ; 

All my fretful fears are banish'd, 

All my dreams of anguish vanish'd ; 

Energy my soul inspires. 

And wakes the Muse's hallow'd fires ; 

Rich in melody, my tongue 

Warbles forth spontaneous song. 

Thus my prison moments gay. 

Swiftly, sweetly, glide away ; 

Till the last long day declining. 

O'er yon tower thy glory shining, 

Shall the welcome signal be 

Of to-morrow's liberty ! 

Liberty triumphant home 

On the rosy wings of morn. 

Liberty shall then return ! 

Rise to set the captive free : 

Rise, O sun of Liberty ! 



PRISON AMUSEMENTS. 



SOLILOaUY OF A WATER- WAGTAIL 



ON THE WALLS OF YORK CASTLE. 



On the walls that guard my prison, 
Swelling with fantastic pride, 

Brisk and merry as the season, 
I a feather'd coxcomb spied : 

When the little hopping elf 

Gaily thus amused himself. 

" Hear your sovereign's proclamation. 
All good subjects, young and old : 
I'm the Lord of the Creation ; 

I — a Water- Wagtail bold ! 
All around, and all you see. 
All the world was made for me ! 

" Yonder sun, so proudly shining, 
Rises — when I leave my nest ; 
And, behind the hills declining, 

Sets — when I retire to rest : 
Morn and evening, thus you see, 
Day and night, were made for me ! 

" Vernal gales to love invite me ; 

Summer sheds for me her beams ; 
Autumn's jovial scenes dehght me ; 

Winter paves with ice my streams 
All the year is mine, you see ; 
Seasons change, like moons, for me ! 

" On the heads of giant mountains. 
Or beneath the shady trees ; 
By the banks of warbhng fountains, 
I enjoy myself at ease : 



THE WATER-WAGTAIL. 



Hills and valleys, thus you see, 
Groves and rivers, made for me ! 

" Boundless are my vast dominions ; 
I can hop, or swim, or fly ; 
When I please, my towering pinions 
Trace my empire through the sky : 
Air and elements, you see, 
Heaven and earth, were made for me ! 

" Birds and insects, beasts and fishes. 
All their humble distance keep ; 
Man, subservient to my wishes, 

Sows the harvest which I reap : 
Mighty man himself, you see. 
All that breathe, were made for me ! 

" 'Twas for my accommodation. 
Nature rose when I was born : 
Should I die- — the whole creation 
Back to nothing would return : 
Sun, moon, and stars, the world, you see, 
Sprung — exist, will fall with me !" 

Here the pretty prattler, ending. 
Spread his wingS to soar away ; 

But a cruel Hawk descending, 

Pounced him up — an helpless prey. 

— Couldst thou not, poor Wagtail ! see, 

That the Hawk was made for thee ? 



^pril 15, 1796. 



PRISON AMUSEMENTS. 



THE PLEASURES OF IMPRISONMENT. 

IN TWO EPISTLES TO A FRIEND. 
EPISTLE I. 

You ask, my friend, and well you may, 
You ask me how I spend the day ; 
I'll tell you, in unstudied rhyme, 
How wisely I befool my time : 
Expect not wit, nor fancy then, 
In this effusion of my pen ; 
These idle lines — they might be worse — 
Are simple prose, in simple verse. 

Each morning, then, at five o'clock, 
The adamantine doors unlock ; 
Bolts, bars, and portals, crash and thunder ; 
The gates of iron burst asunder ; 
Hinges that creak, and keys that jingle. 
With clattering chains, in concert mingle ; 
So sweet the din, your dainty ear. 
For joy, would break its drum to hear ; 
While my dull organs, at the sound. 
Rest in tranquillity profound: 
Fantastic dreams amuse my brain, 
And waft my spirit home again. 
Though captive all day long 'tis true, 
At night I am as free as you ; 
Not ramparts high, nor dungeons deep, 
Can hold me when I'm fast sleep. 

But every thing is good in season, 
I dream at large — and wake in prison. 
Yet think not, sir, I he too late, 
I rise as early even as eight : 
Ten hours of drowsiness are plenty. 



THE PLEASURES OF IMPRISONMENT. 



For any man, in four-and-twenty. 
You smile — and yet 'tis nobly done, 
I'm but five hours behind the sun ! 

When dress'd, I to the yard repair, 
And breakfast on the pure, fresh air : 
But though this choice Castalian cheer 
Keeps both the head and stomach clear, 
For reasons strong enough with me, 
I mend the meal with toast and tea. 
Now air and fame, as poets sing, 
Are both the same, the self-same thing : 
Yet bards are not cameleons quite, 
And heavenly food is very hght ; 
Whoever dined or supp'd on fame, 
And went to bed upon a name ? 

Breakfast despatch'd, I sometimes read, 
To clear the vapours from my head ; 
For books are magic charms, I ween, 
Both for the crotchets and the spleen. 
When genius, wisdom, wit abound. 
Where sound is sense, and sense is sound ; 
When art and nature both combine. 
And hve, and breathe, in every line ; 
The reader glows along the page 
With all the author's native rage ! 
But books there are with nothing fraught, — 
Ten thousand words, and ne'er a thought ; 
Where periods without period crawl. 
Like caterpillars on a wall. 
That fall to climb, and climb to fall ; 
While still their efforts only tend 
To keep them from their journey's end. 
The readers yawn with pure vexation. 
And nod — but not with approbation. 
In such a fog of dulness lost. 
Poor patience must give up the ghost ; 
Not Argus' eyes awake could keep, 
Even Death might read himself to sleep. 



PRISON AMUSEMENTS. 



At half-past ten, or thereabout, 
My eyes are all upon the scout. 
To see the lounging post-boy come, 
With letters or with news from home. 
Believe it, on a captive's word, 
Ahhough the doctrine seem absurd. 
The paper-messengers of friends 
For absence almost make amends : 
But if you think I jest or lie, 
Come to York Castle, sir, and try. 

Sometimes to fairy land I rove : 
Those iron rails become a grove ; 
These stately buildings fall away 
To moss-grown cottages of clay ; 
Debtors are changed to jolly swains, 
Who pipe and whistle on the plains ; 
Yon felons grim, with fetters bound, 
Are saij'rs wild, with garlands crown'd; 
Their clanking chains are wreaths of flowers ; 
Their horrid cells ambrosial bowers : 
The oaths, expiring on their tongues, 
Are metamorphosed into songs ; 
While wretched female prisoners, lo ! 
Are Dian's nymphs of virgin snow. 
Those hideous walls with verdure shoot ; 
These pillars bend with blushing fruit ; 
That dunghill swells into a mountain, 
The pump becomes a purling fountain ; 
The noisome smoke of yonder mills. 
The circHng air Avith fragrance fills ; 
The horse-pond spreads into a lake. 
And swans of ducks and geese I make ; 
Sparrows are changed to turtle-doves, 
That bill and coo their pretty loves ; 
Wagtails, turn'd thrushes, charm the vales. 
And tomtits sing like nightingales. 
No more the wind through key-holes whistles. 
But sighs on beds of pinks and thistles ; 




The rattling rain that beats without, 

And gurgles down the leaden spout, 

In hght, deh'cious dew distils, 

And melts away in amber rills ; 

Elysium rises on the green, 

And health and beauty crown the scene. 

Then by the enchantress Fancy led, 
On violet banks I lay my head ; 
Legions of radiant forms arise, 
In fair array, before mine eyes ; 
Poetic visions gild my brain, 
And melt in liquid air again ; 
As in a magic-lantern clear, 
Fantastic images appear. 
That beaming from the spectred glass. 
In beautiful succession pass, 
Yet steal the lustre of their light 
From the deep shadow of the night : 
Thus, in the darkness of my head. 
Ten thousand shining things are bred, 
That borrow splendour from the gloom. 
As glow-worms twinkle in a tomb. 
But lest these glories should confound me. 
Kind Dulness draws her curtain round me 
The visions vanish in a trice. 
And I awake as cold as ice : 
Nothing remains of all the vapour, 
Save — what I send you — ink and paper. 

Thus flow my morning hours along. 
Smooth as the numbers of my song : 
Yet let me wander as I will, 
I feel I am a prisoner still. 
Thus Robin, with the blushing breast, 
Is ravish'd from his httle nest 
By barbarous boys who bind his leg. 
To make him flutter round a peg : 
See the glad captive spreads his wings, 
Mounts, in a moment, mounts and sings. 




When suddenly the cruel chain 
Twitches him back to earth again. 
— The clock strikes one — I can't delay, 
For dinner comes but once a day : 
At present, worthy friend, fareAvell ; 
But by to-morrow's post I'll tell. 
How, during these half-dozen moons, 
I cheat the lazy afternoons. 

June 13, 1796. 



EPISTLE II. 

In this sweet place, where freedom reigns, 
Secured by bolts, and snug in chains ; 
Where innocence and guilt together 
Roost Hke two turtles of a feather ; 
Where debtors safe at anchor lie 
From saucy duns and bailiffs sly ; 
Where highwaymen and robbers stout 
Would, rather than break in, break out : 
Where all's so guarded and recluse. 
That none his liberty can lose ; 
Here each may, as his means afford. 
Dine like a pauper or a lord, 
And those who can't the cost defray, 
May live to dine another day. 

Now let us ramble o'er the green. 
To see and hear what's heard and seen ; 
To breathe the air, enjoy the light. 
And hail yon sun, Avho shines as bright 
Upon the dungeon and the gallows 

I As on York Minster or Kew Palace. 

I ' And here let us the scene review : — 

That's the old castle, this the new ; 
Yonder the felons walk, and there 
The lady-prisoners take the air ; 



THE PLEASURES OF IMPRISONMENT. 



Behind are solitary cells, 

Where hermits live Hke snails in shells ; 

There stands the chapel for good people ; 

That black balcony is the steeple ; 

How gaily spins the weathercock ! 

How proudly shines the crazy clock ! 

A clock, whose wheels eccentric run. 

More like my head than like the sun : 

And yet it shows us, right or wrong, 

The days are only twelve hours long ; 

Though captives often reckon here 

Each day a month, each month a year. 

There honest William stands in state, 

The porter, at the horrid gate ; 

Yet no ill-natured soul is he. 

Entrance to all the world is free ; 

One thing, indeed, is rather hard, . 

Egress is frequently debarr'd : 

Of all the joys within that reign. 

There's none like — getting out again ! 

Across the green, behold the court. 

Where jargon reigns and wigs resort ! 

Where bloody tongues fight bloodless battles, 

For life and death, for straws and rattles ; 

Where juries yawn their patience out, 

And judges dream in spite of gout. 

There, on the outside of the door, 

(As sang a wicked wag of yore,) 

Stands Mother Justice, tall and thin. 

Who never yet hath ventured in. 

The cause, my friend, may soon be shown, 

The lady was a stepping-stone, 

Till — though the metamorphose odd is — 

A chisel made the block a goddess : 

— " Odd !" did I say ? — I'm wrong this time ; 

But I was hamper'd for a rhyme : 

Justice at — I could tell you where — 

Is just the same as justice there. 



PRISON AMUSEMENTS. 



But lo ! my frisking dog attends, 
The kindest of four-footed friends ; 
Brim-full of giddiness and mirth, 
He is the prettiest fool on earth. 
The rogue is twice a squirrel's size, 
With short snub nose and big black eyes ; 
A cloud of brown adorns his tail, 
That curls and serves him for a sail ; 
The same deep auburn d)^es his ears, 
That never were abridged by shears : 
While white around, as Lapland snows, 
His hair, in soft profusion, flows ; 
Waves on his breast, and plumes his feet 
With glossy fringe, like feathers fleet. 
A thousand antic tricks he plays, 
And looks at one a thousand ways ; 
His wit, if he has any, lies 
Somewhere between his tail and eyes ; 
Sooner the light those eyes will fail, 
Than BiUi/ cease to wag that tail. 

And yet the fellow ne'er is safe 
From the tremendous beak of Ralph ; 
A raven grim, in black and blue, 
As arch a knave as e'er you knew ; 
Who hops about with broken pinions, 
And thinks these walls his own dominions. 
This wag a mortal foe to Bill is. 
They fight hke Hector and Achilles ; 
Bold Billy runs with all his might. 
And conquers, Parthian-like, in flight ; 
While Ralph his own importance feels. 
And wages endless war with heels : 
Horses and dogs, and geese and deer, 
He shly pinches in the rear ; 
They start surprised with sudden pain. 
While honest Ralph sheers oflf again. 

A melancholy stag appears. 
With rueful look and flagging ears ; 



THE PLEASURES OF IMPRISONMENT. 



A feeble, lean, consumptive elf. 
The very picture of myself! 
My ghost-like form, and new-moon phiz, 
Are just the counterparts of his : 
Blasted like me by fortune's frown ; 
Like me, twice hunted, twice run down ! 
Like me pursued, almost to death, 
He's come to jail, to save his breath ! 
Still, on his painful limbs, are seen 
The scars where Avorrying dogs have been 
Still, on his wo-imprinted face, 
I weep a broken heart to trace. 
Daily the mournful wretch I feed 
With crumbs of comfort and of bread ; 
But man, false man ! so well he knows. 
He deems the species all his foes : 
In vain I smile to soothe his fear. 
He will not, dare not, come too near ; 
He lingers — looks — and fain he would — 
Then strains his neck to reach the food. 
Oft as his plaintive looks I see, 
A brother's bowels yearn in me. 
What rocks and tempests yet await 
Both him and me, we leave to fate : 
We know, by past experience taught, 
That innocence availeth naught : 
I feel, and 'tis my proudest boast. 
That conscience is itself an host : 
While this inspires my swelling breast. 
Let all forsake me — I'm at rest ; 
Ten thousand deaths, in every nerve, 
I'd rather suffer than deserve. 

But yonder comes the victim's wife, 
A dappled doe, all fire and life : 
She trips along with gallant pace, 
Her limbs alert, her motion grace : 
Soft as the moonlight fairies bound, 
Her footsteps scarcely kiss the ground ; 



PRISON AMUSEMENTS. 



Gently she lifts her fair brown head, 

And licks my hand, and begs for broad : 

I pat her forehead, stroke her neck, 

She starts and gives a timid squeak ; 

Then, while her eye with brilliance burns. 

The fawning animal returns ; 

Pricks her bob-tail, and waves her ears, 

And happier than a queen appears : 

— Poor beast ! from fell ambition free, 

And all the woes of liberty ; 

Born in a jail, a prisoner bred, 

No dreams of hunting rack thine head ; 

Ah ! mayst thou never pass these bounds 

To see the world — and feel the hounds ! 

Still all her beauty, all her art. 

Have fail'd to win her husband's heart : 

Her lambent eyes, and lovely chest ; 

Her swan-white neck, and ermine breast ; 

Her taper legs, and spotty hide. 

So softl}^ delicately pied. 

In vain their fond allurements spread, — 

To love and joy her spouse is dead. 

But lo ! the evening shadows fall ^ 
Broader and browner from the wall ; 
A warning voice, like curfew bell. 
Commands each captive to his cell ; 
My faithful dog and I retire, 
To play and chatter by the fire : 
Soon comes a turnkey Avith " Good night, sir !' 
And bolts the door Avith all his might, sir : 
Then leisurely to bed I creep. 
And sometimes wake — and sometimes sleep. 
These are the joys that reign in prison, 
And if Pm happy 'tis with reason : 
Yet still this prospect o'er the rest 
Makes every blessing doubly blest ; 
That soon these pleasures will be vanish'd. 
And I, from all these comforts, banish'd ! 



THE BRAMIN. 



THE BRAMIN. 

EXTRACT FROM CANTO I. 

Once, on the mountain's balmy lap reclined, 
The sage unlock'd the treasures of his mind ; 
Pure from his lips sublime instruction came, 
As the blest altar breathes celestial flame ; 
A band of youths and virgins round him press'd, 
Whom thus the prophet and the sage address'd :— 
" Through the wide universe's boundless range, 
All that exist decay, revive, and change : 
No atom torpid or inactive lies ; 
A being, once created, never dies. 
The waning moon, when quench'd in shades of night, 
Renews her youth with all the charms of light ; 
The flowery beauties of the blooming year 
Shrink from the shivering blast, and disappear ; 
Yet, warm'd with quickening showers of genial rain, 
Spring from their graves, and purple all the plain. 
As day the night, and night succeeds the day, 
So death re-animates, so lives decay : 
Like billows on the undulating main. 
The swelling fall, the falling swell again ; 
Thus on the tide of time, inconstant, roll 
The dying body and the living soul. 
In every animal, inspired with breath. 
The flowers of life produce the seeds of death ; — 
The seeds of death, though scatter'd in the tomb, 
Spring with new vigour, vegetate and bloom. 

" When wasted down to dust the creature dies, 
Quick, from its cell, the enfranchised spirit flies ; 
Fills, with fresh energy, another form. 
And towers an elephant, or glides a worm ; 
The awful lion's royal shape assumes ; 
The fox's subtlety, or peacock's plumes ; 



PRISON AMUSEMENTS. 



Swims, like an eagle, in the eye of noon. 

Or wails, a screech-owl, to the deaf, cold moon ; 

Haunts the dread brakes where serpents hiss and glare, 

Or hums, a glittering insect in the air. 

The illustrious souls of great and virtuous men, 

In noble animals revive again : 

But base and vicious spirits wind their way, 

In scorpions, vultures, sharks, and beasts of prey. 

The fair, the gay, the witty, and the brave, . 

The fool, the coward, courtier, tyrant, slave ; 

Each, in congenial animals, shall find 

A home and kindred for his wandering mind. 

" Even the cold body, when enshrined in earth, 
Rises again in vegetable birth : 
From the vile ashes of the bad proceeds 
A baneful harvest of pernicious weeds ; 
The relics of the good, awaked by showers. 
Peep from the lap of death, and live in flowers ; 
Sweet modest flowers, that blush along the vale, 
Whose fragrant lips embalm the passing gale." 



EXTRACT FROM CANTO II. 

• *«•*• 

" Now, mark the words these dying hps impart. 
And wear this grand memorial round your heart : 
All that inhabit ocean, air, or earth. 
From ONE ETKRNAL SIRE derive their birth. 
The Hand that built the palace of the sky 
Form'd the light wings that decorate a fly : 
The Power that wheels the circling planets round 
Rears every infant floweret on the ground ; 
That Bounty which the mightiest beings share 
Feeds the least gnat that gilds the evening air. 
Thus all the Avild inhabitants of woods. 
Children of air, and tenants of the floods; 
All, all are equal, independent, free, 
And all the heirs of immortality ! 



THE BRAMIN. 

For all that live and breathe have once been men, 
And, in succession, will be such again : 
Even you, in turn, that human shape must change, 
And through ten thousand forms of being range. 

" Ah ! then, refrain your brethren's blood to spill, 
And, till you can create, forbear to kill ! 
Oft as a guiltless fellow-creature dies. 
The blood of innocence for vengeance cries : 
Even grim, rapacious savages of prey, 
Presume not, save in self-defence, to slay ; 
What, though to heaven their forfeit hves they owe, 
Hath heaven commission'd thee to deal the blow ? 
Crush not the feeble, inoffensive worm, 
Thy sister's spirit wears that humble form ! 
Why should thy cruel arrow smite yon bird ? 
In him thy brother's plaintive song is heard. 
When the poor, harmless kid, all trembling, lies, 
And begs his httle life with infant cries. 
Think, ere you take the throbbing victim's breath, 
You doom a dear, an only child, to death. 
When at the ring the beauteous heifer stands, 
— Stay, monster ! stay those parricidal hands ; 
Canst thou not, in that mild, dejected face. 
The sacred features of thy mother trace ? 
When to the stake the generous bull you lead, 

I Tremble, — ah, tremble, — lest your father bleed. 

j Let not your anger on your dog descend, 

[ The faithful animal was once your friend ; 

I The friend whose courage snatch'd you from the grave, 

When wrapp'd in flames or sinking in the wave. 
— Rash, impious youth ! renounce that horrid knife. 
Spare the sweet antelope ! — ah, spare — thy wife ! 

j In the meek victim's tear-illumined eyes, 

j See the soft image of thy consort rise ; 

Such as she is, when by romantic streams 
Her spirit greets thee in delightful dreams ; 
Not as she look'd, when blighted in her bloom ; 
Not as she lies, all pale m yonder tomb ; 



PRISON AMUSEMENTS. 



That mournful tomb, where all th}^ joys repose ! 
That hallow'd tomb, Avhere all thy griefs shall close. 

" While yet I sing, the weary king of light 
Resigns his sceptre to the queen of night ; 
Unnumber'd orbs of living fire appear. 
And roll in glittering grandeur o'er the sphere. 
Perhaps the soul, released from earthly ties, 
A thousand ages hence may mount the skies ; 
Through suns and planets, stars, and systems range, 
In each new forms assume, relinquish, change ; 
From age to age, from world to world aspire, 
And climb the scale of being higher and higher : 
But who these awful mysteries dare explore ? 
Pause, O my soul ! and tremble and adore. 

" There is a Power, all other powers above. 
Whose name is Goodness, and His nature Love ; 
Who call'd the infant universe to light. 
From central nothing and circumfluent night. 
On His great providence all worlds depend, 
As trembling atoms to their centre tend ; 
In Nature's face His glory shines confess'd, 
She wears His sacred image on her breast ; 
His spirit breathes in every living soul ; 
His bounty feeds, his presence fills the whole ; 
Though seen, invisible — though felt, unknown ; 
All that exist, exist in Him alone. 
But who the wonders of His hand can trace 
Through the dread ocean of unfathom'd space ? 
When from the shore we lift our fainting eyes. 
Where boundless scenes of Godlike grandeur rise ; 
Like sparkling atoms in the noontide rays. 
Worlds, stars, and suns, and universes blaze. 
Yet these transcendent monuments that shine, 
Eternal miracles of skill divine, 
These, and ten thousand more, are only still 
The shadow of his power, the transcript of his will." 

April 14, 1796. 



A TALE TOO TRUE. 



A TALE TOO TRUE: 

Being a supplement to The Prison Jlmvscments, originally pnbliiitied under the 
name of Paul Positive, in which ninny of the Author's Juvenile Verses were 
composed. The fDllowing were written at Scarborough, whither he had re- 
tired, on being liberated from York Castle, for the recovery of his health, be- 
fore he returned home. They are dated July 23, 1796, and were literally a 
summer-day's labour. 

One beautiful morning, when Paul was a child, 

And went with a satchel to school, 
The rogue play'd the truant, which shows he was wild. 

And though little, a very great fool. 

He came to a cottage that grew on the moor, 

No mushroona was ever so strong ; 
'Twas snug as a mouse-trap ; and close by the door 

A river ran rippling along. 

The cot was embosom'd in rook-nested trees, 

The chestnut, the elm, and the oak ; 
Geese gabbled in concert with bagpiping bees. 

While softly ascended the smoke. 

At the door sat a damsel, a sweet little girl, 

Array'd in a petticoat green ; 
Her skin was lovely as mother of pearl, 

And milder than moonlight her mien. 

She sang as she knotted a garland of flowers, 

Right mellowly Avarbled her tongue ; 
Such strains in Elysium's romantical bowers, 

To soothe the departed are sung. 

Paul stood like a gander, he stood like himself, 
Eyes, ears, nose, and mouth open'd Avide ; 

When suddenly rising, the pretty young elf 
The wonder-struck wanderer spied. 



PRISON AMUSEMENTS. 



She started and trembled, she blush'd and she smiled, 

Then dropping a courtesy she said, 
" Pray, what brought you hither, my dear little child ? 

Did your legs run away with your head ?" 

" Yes ! yes !" stammer'd Paul, and he made a fine bow, 

At least 'twas the finest he could, 
Though the lofty-bred belles of St. James's, I trow, 

Would have call'd it a bow made of wood. 

No matter, the dimple-cheek'd damsel was pleased, 

And modestly gave him her wrist ; 
Paul took the fine present, and tenderly squeezed, 

As if 'twere a wasp in his fist. 

Then into the cottage she led the young fool. 

Who stood all aghast to behold 
The lass's grim mother, Avho managed a school, 

A beldame, a witch, and a scold. 

Her eyes were as red as two lobsters when boil'd, 

Her complexion the colour of straw ; 
Though she grinn'd like a death's head whenever she 
smiled. 

She show'd not a tooth in her jaw. 

Her body was shrivell'd and dried like a kecks. 
Her arms were all veins, bone, and skin ; 

And then she'd a beard, sir, in spite of her sex, 
I don't know how long, on her chin. 

Her dress was as mournful as mourning could be, 
Black sackcloth, bleach'd white with her tears ; 

For a widow, fair ladies ! a widow was she. 
Most dismally stricken in years. 

The charms of her youth, if she ever had any. 

Were all under total eclipse ; 
While the charms of her daughter, who truly had many, 

Were only unfolding their lips. 



A TALE TOO TRUE. 

Thus, far in a wilderness, bleak and forlorn, 

When winter deflowers the year. 
All hoary and horrid, I've seen an old thorn, 

In icicle trappings a|>pear : 

While a sweet-smiling snow-drop enamels its root, 
Like the morning-star gladdening the sky; 

Or an elegant crocus peeps out at its foot, 
As blue as Miss Who-ye-will's eye. 

' Dear mother !" the damsel exclaim'd with a sigh, 

" I have brought you a poor little wretch. 
Your victim and mine," — but a tear from her eye 
Wash'd away all the rest of her speech. 

The beldame then mounting her spectacles on, 
Like an arch o'er the bridge of her nose, 

Examined the captive, and crying " Well done !" 
Bade him welcome with twenty dry blows. 

Paul fell down astounded, and only not dead, 

For death was not quite within call ; 
Recovering he found himself in a warm bed, 
And in a warm fever and all. 

Reclined on her elbow, to anguish a prey. 

The maiden in lovely distress 
Sate weeping her soul from her eyelids away ; 

How could the fair mourner do less ? 

But when she perceived him reviving again, 

She caroll'd a sonnet so sweet, 
The captive, transported, forgot all his pain, 

And presently fell at her feet. 

All rapture and fondness, all folly and joy, 
" Dear damsel ! for your sake," he cried, 

" I'll be your cross mother's own dutiful boy, 
And you shall one day be my bride." 



PRISON AMUSEMENTS. 



" For shame !" quoth the nymph, though she look'd the 
reverse, 
" Such nonsense I cannot approve ; 
Too youn<T we're towed." — Paul said, " So much the 
worse ; 
But are we too young then to love ?" 

The lady replied in a language that speaks 

Not unto the ear but the eye ; 
The language that blushes through eloquent cheeks, 

When modesty looks very sly. 

Our true lovers lived, — for the fable saith true, — 

As merry as larks in their nest, 
Who are learning to sing while the hawk is in view, 

— The ignorant always are blest. 

Through valleys and meadows they Avander'd by day, 

And warbled and whistled along ; 
So liquidly gHded their moments away. 

Their hfe was a galloping song. 

When they twitter'd their notes from the top of a hill. 

If November did not look like May, 
If rocks did not caper, nor rivers stand still. 

The asses at least did not bray. 

If the trees did not leap nor the mountains advance. 
They were deafer than bailiffs, 'tis clear ; 

If sun, moon, and stars did not lead up a dance. 
They wanted a musical ear. 

But sometimes the beldame, cross, crazy, and old, 
AVould thunder, and threaten, and swear; 

Expose them to tempests, to heat, and to cold. 
To danger, fatigue, and despair. 

For wisdom, she argued, could only be taught 
By bitter expori' ii?e to fools. 



A TALE TOO TRUE. 



And she acted as every good school-mistress ought, 
Quite up to the beard of her rules. 

Her school, by-the-bye, was the noblest on earth 

For mortals to study themselves ; 
There many great folks, who were folios by birth, 

She cut down to pitiful twelves. 

Her rod hke death's scythe, in her levelHng hand, 
Bow'd down rich, poor, wicked, and just ; 

Kings, queens, popes, and heroes, the touch of her 
wand 
Could crumble to primitive dust. 

At length in due season, the planets that reign, 

By chance or some similar art. 
Commanded the damsel to honour her swain 

With her hand as the key to her heart. 

The grisly old mother then blest the fond pair ; 

— " While you live, O my darlings !" she cried, 
"My favours unask'd for you always shall share, 

And cleave like two ribs to my side. 

" Poor Paul is a blockhead in marrow and bone. 
Whom naught but my rod can make wise ; 

The fellow will only, when all's said and done. 
Be just fit to live when he dies." 

The witch was a prophetess, all must allow. 
And Paul a strange moon-stricken youth. 

Who somewhere had pick'd up, I'll not tell you how, 
A sad knack of telhng the truth. 

His sorrows and sufferings his consort may paint, 

In colours of water and fire ; 
She saw him in prison, desponding and faint, 

She saw him in act to expire. 



PRISON AMUSEMENTS. 



Then melting her voice to the lenderest tone, 

The lovely enthusiast began 
To sing in sweet numbers the comforts unknown, 

That solace the soul of the man, 

Who, hated, forsaken, tormented, opprest. 

And wresthng with anguish severe, 
Can turn his eye inward, and view in his breast 

A conscience unclouded and clear. 

The captive iook'd up with a languishing eye. 

Half quench'd in a tremulous tear; 
He saw the meek Angel of Hope standing by, 

He heard her solicit his ear. 

Her strain then exalting, and swelling her lyre. 
The triumphs of patience she sung, 

While passions of music and language of fire 
Flow'd full and sublime from her tongue. 

At length the gay morning of liberty shone, 
At length the dread portals flew wide ; 

Then hailing each other with transports unknown. 
The captive escaped Avith his bride. 

Behold in a fable the Poet's own life, 
From which this lean moral we draw, 

— The Muse is Paul Positive's nightingale-wife. 
Misfortune his mother-in-law. 



THE 



WANDERER OF SWITZERLAND. 



A POEM, IN SIX PARTS. 



The historical facts alluded to in the following narrative may be found in the 
Supplement to Coxe's Travels in Switzerland, Planta's History of the Helvetic 
Confederacy, and Zschokke's Invasion of Switzerland by the French in 1798, 
translated by Dr. Aiken. 



THE WANDERER OF SWITZERLAND. 



PART I. 

A Wanderer of Switzerland and his Family, consisting of his Wife, his Daughter, 
and her young Children, emigrating from their Country, in consequence of its 
Subjugation by the French in 1793, arrive at the Cottage of a Shepherd, beyond 
the Frontiers, where they are hospitably entertained. 

Shep. " Wanderer, whither dost thou roam ? 
Weary wanderer, old and gray? 
Wherefore hast thou left thine home 
In the sunset of thy day?" 

Wand. " In the sunset of my day, 

Stranger, I have lost my home : 

Weary, wandering, old and gray, 

Therefore, therefore do I roam. 

Here mine arms a wife enfold, 
Fainting in their weak embrace ; 

There my daughter's charms behold, 
Withering in that widow'd face. 

These her infants — Oh their sire, 
Worthy of the race of TELL, 
In the battle's fiercest fire, 

— In his country's battle fell !" 

Shep. " Switzerland then gave thee birth?" 
Wand. " Av — 'twas Switzerland of yore ; 
But, degraded spot of earth ! 

Thou art Switzerland no more : 

O'er thy mountains, sunk in blood, 

Are the waves of ruin hurl'd ; 
Like the waters of the flood 

Rollincf round a buried world." 



THE WANDERER OF SWITZERLAND. 



Shep. " Yet will Time the deluge stop : 

Then may Switzerland be blest : 
On St. Golhard's* hoary top 
Shall the ark of freedom rest." 

Wand. " No ! — Irreparably lost, 

On the day that made us slaves, 
Freedom's ark, by tempest tost, 

Founder'd in the swallowing waves." 

Shep. " Welcome, wanderer, as thou art. 
All my blessings to partake ; 
Yet thrice welcome to my heart 
For thine injured country's sake. 

On the western hills afar 

Evening lingers with delight. 

While she views her favourite star 
Brightening on the brow of night. 

Here, though lowly be my lot, 
Enter freely, freely share 

All the comforts of my cot, 
Humble shelter, homely fare. 

Spouse ! I bring a suffering guest, 

With his family of grief; 
Give the weary pilgrim rest. 

Yield the exiles sweet relief." 

S. Wife. "I will yield them sweet relief: 

Weary pilgrims ! welcome here ; 
Welcome, family of grief! 

Welcome to my warmest cheer." 

Wand. " When in prayer the broken heart 
Asks a blessing from above, 
Heaven shall take the wanderer's part. 
Heaven reward the stranger's love." 



* St. Gothabd is the name of the highe 
birth-place of Swiss independence. 



: canton of Uri, the 



THE WANDERER OF SWITZERLAND. 



Shep. "Haste, recruit the failing fire, 
High the winter-fagots raise : 
See the crackling flames aspire ; 
Oh how cheerfully they blaze ! 

Mourners ! now forget your cares, 
And, till supper-board be crown'd, 

Closely draw your fire-side chairs; 
Form the dear domestic round." 

Wand. " Host ! thy smiling daughters bring, 
Bring those rosy lads of thine : 
Let them mingle in the ring 

With these poor lost babes of mine.' 

Shep. " Join the ring, my girls and boys : 
This enchanting circle, this 
Binds the social loves and joys ; 
'Tis the fairy ring of bliss !" 

Wand. " O ye loves and joys ! that sport 
In the fairy ring of bliss. 
Oft with me ye held your court ; 
I had once a home like this ! 

Bountiful my former lot 

As my native country's rills ; 

The foundations of my cot 
Were her everlasting hills. 

But those streams no longer pour 
Rich abundance round my lands ; 

And my father's cot no more 
On my father's mountain stands. 

By an hundred vvinters piled, 

When the glaciers,' dark with death, 

Hang o'er precipices wild. 

Hang — suspended by a breath : 

If a pulse but throb alarm, 

Headlong down the steeps they fall ; 



— For a pulse will break the charm, — 
Bounding, bursting, burying all. 

Struck with horror, stiff and pale, 
When the chaos breaks on high, 

All that view it from the vale. 
All that hear it coming, die : — 

In a day and hour accurst, 

O'er the Avretched land of TELL, 

Thus the Gallic ruin burst, 
Thus the Gallic glacier fell !" 

Shep. " Hush that melancholy strain ; 
Wipe those unavailing tears :" 
Wand. " Nay — I must, I will complain ; 
'Tis the privilege of years : 

'Tis the privilege of wo. 

Thus her anguish to impart : 

And the tears that freely flow 
Ease the agonizing heart." 

Shep. " Yet suspend thy griefs awhile : 

See the plenteous table crown'd ; 
And my wife's endearing smile 
Beams a rosy Avelcome round. 

Cheese from mountain dairies prest, 
Wholesome herbs, nutritious roots. 

Honey from the wild-bee's nest. 
Cheering wine and ripen'd fruits : 

These, with soul-sustaining bread, 
My paternal fields afford : — 

On such fare our fathers fed ; 

Hoary pilgrijn ! bless the board." 




PART II. 

.^ftir supper, the Wanderer, at the desire of his host, relates the sorrows and suf- 
ferings of his Country, during the Invasion and Conquest of it by the French, 
in connection with ftis own Story. 

Shep. " Wanderer ! bow'd with griefs and years, 
Wanderer, with the cheek so pale. 
Oh give language to those tears ! 
Tell their melancholy tale." 

Wand. " Stranger-friend, the tears that flow 
Down the channels of this cheek 
Tell a mystery of wo 

Which no human tongue can speak. 

Not the pangs of ' hope deferr'd' 

My tormented bosom tear : — 
On the tomb of hope interr'd 

Scowls the spectre of despair. 

Where the Alpine summits rise, 

Height o'er height stupendous hurl'd ; 

Like the pillars of the skies. 

Like the ramparts of the world : 

Born in freedom's eagle nest, 

Rock'd by whirlwinds in their rage. 

Nursed at freedom's stormy breast. 
Lived my sires from age to age. 

High o'er Underwalden's vale. 
Where the forest fronts the morn ; 

Whence the boundless eye might sail 
O'er a sea of mountains borne ; 

There my little native cot 

Peep'd upon my father's farm : — 

Oh ! it was a happy spot. 
Rich in every rural charm ! 



THE WANDERER OF SWITZERLAND. 



There my life, a silent stream, 
Glid along, yet seem'd at rest ; 

Lovely as an infant's dream 
On the waking mother's breast. 

Till the storm that wreck'd the world, 

In its horrible career, 
Into hopeless ruin hurl'd 

All this aching heart held dear. 

On the princely towers of Berne 
Fell the Gallic thunder-stroke : 

To the lake of poor Lucerne, 
All submitted to the yoke. 

Reding then his standard raised. 
Drew his sAvord on Brunnen's plain ,^ 

But in vain his banner blazed. 
Reding drew his sAvord in vain. 

Where our conquering fathers died ; 

Where their awful bones repose ; 
Thrice the battle's fate he tried. 

Thrice o'erthrew his country's foes.^ 

Happy then were those who fell 
Fighting on their father's graves ! 

Wretched those who lived to tell 
Treason made the victors slaves !* 

Thus my country's life retired, 
Slowly driven from part to part : 

Underwalden last expired ; 
Underwalden was the heart.' 

In the valley of their birth, 

Where our guardian mountains stand: 
In the eye of heaven and earth, 

Met the warriors of our land. 

Like their sires in olden time, 
Arm'd they met in stern debate ; 



While in every breast sublime 
Glow'd the Spirit of the State. 

Gallia's menace fired their blood ; 

With one heart and voice they rose : 
Hand in hand the heroes stood, 

And defied their faithless foes. 

Then to heaven, in calm despair, 
As they turn'd the tearless eye, 

By their country's wrongs they sware 
With their country's rights to die. 

Albert from the council came : 
(My poor daughter was his wife ; 

All the valley loved his name ; 
Albert was my staff of life.) 

From the council-field he came ; 

All his noble visage burn'd ; 
At his look I caught the flame. 

At his voice my youth returned. 

Fire from heaven my heart renew'd : 
Vigour beat through every vein ; 

All the powers that age had hew'd 
Started into strengtii again. 

Sudden from my couch I sprang, 
Every limb to life restored ; 

With the bound my cottage rang, 
As I snatch'd my father's sword. 

This the weapon they did wield 
On Morgarthen's dreadful day ; 

And through Sempach's'' iron field 
This the ploughshare of their way. 

Then, my spouse ! in vain thy fears 
Strove my fury to restrain ; 

O my daughter ! all thy tears. 
All thy children's, were in vain. 



Gluickly from our hastening foes 
Albert's active care removed, 

Far amidst the eternal snows, 

These who loved us, — these beloved.? 

Then our cottage we forsook ; 

Yet, as down the steeps we passed. 
Many an agonizing look 

Homeward o'er the hills we cast. 

Now we reach'd the nether glen, 
Where in arms our brethren lay; 

Thrice five hundred fearless men. 
Men of adamant were they ! 

Nature's bulwarks built by Time, 

'Gainst eternity to stand, 
Mountains terribly sublime, 

Girt the camp on either hand. 

Dim, behind, the valley brake 
Into rocks that fled from view; 

Fair in front the gleaming lake 
RoU'd its waters bright and blue. 

Midst the hamlets of the dale, 

Stantz,* with simple grandeur crown'd, 
Seem'd the mother of the vale. 

With her children scatter'd round. 

Midst the ruins of the vale. 
Now she bows her hoary head. 

Like the widow of the vale 

Weeping o'er her offspring dead. 

Happier then had been her fate. 

Ere she fell by such a foe. 
Had an earthquake sunk her state, 

Or the lightning laid her low !" 

* The capital of IIndebwalden. 



TH1-: \VANDn:RKR OF SWITZERLAND. 



Shep. " B}' the lightning's deadly flash 

Would her foes had been consumed ! 
Or amidst the earthquake's crash 
Suddenly, alive, entomb'd ! 



Why did justice not prevail ?" 
Wand. "Ah ! it was not thus to be !' 
Shep. " Man of grief, pursue thy tale 
To the death of liberty." 



PART III. 

The Wanderer continues his Narrative, and describes the Battle and Massacre of 
Underwalden. 

JVand. " From the valley we descried, 

As the Gauls approach'd our shores, 
Keels that darken'd all the tide, 
Tempesting the lake with oars. 

Then the mountain-echoes rang 

With the clangour of alarms : 
Shrill the signal-trumpet sang ; 

All our warriors leap'd to arms. 

On the margin of the flood, 

While the frantic foe drew nigh ; 

Grim as watching wolves we stood, 
Prompt as eagles stretch'd to fly. 

In a deluge upon land 

Burst their overwhelming might: 

Back we hurl'd them from the strand, 
Oft returning to the fight. 

Fierce and long the combat held ; 

Till the waves were warm with blood, 
Till the booming waters swell'd 

As they sank beneath the flood. ^ 



THE WANDKUKR Ol' SWITZERLAND. 



For, on that triumphant dav. 

Underwalden's arms once more 
Broke oppression's black array, 

Dash'd invasion from her shore. 

Gaul's surviving barks retired, 
Muttering- vengeance as they fled : 

Hope in us, by conquest fired, 
Raised our spirits from the dead. 

From the dead our spirits rose, 
To the dead they soon return'd ; 

Bright, on its eternal close, 
Underwalden's glory burn'd. 

Star of Switzerland ! whose rays 
Shed such sweet expiring light. 

Ere the Gallic comet's blaze 
Swept thy beauty into night : — 

Star of Switzerland ! thy fame 
No recording bard hath sung : 

Yet be thine immortal name 
Inspiration to my tongue \^ 

While the lingering moon delay'd 

In the wilderness of night, 
Ere the morn awoke the shade 

Into loveliness and light ; — 

Gallia's tigers, wild for blood, 
Darted on our sleeping fold ; 

Down the mountains, o'er the flood, 
Dark as thunder-clouds they roll'd. 

By the trumpet's voice alarm'd. 
All the valley burst awake ; 

All were in a moment arm'd, 
From the barriers to the lake. 

In that valley, on that shore, 

When the graves give up their dead, 



THE WANDERER OF SWITZERLAND. 



At the trumpet's voice once more 

Shall those slumberers quit their bed. 

For the glen that gave them birth 
Hides their ashes in its womb : 

Oh ! 'tis venerable earth, 

Freedom's cradle, freedom's tomb. 

Then on every side begun 

That unutterable fight ; 
Never rose the astonish'd sun 

On so horrible a sight. 

Once an eagle of the rock 
('Twas an omen of our fate) 

Stoop'd, and from my scatter'd flock 
Bore a lambkin to his mate. 

While the parents fed their young, 
Lo ! a cloud of vultures lean, 

By voracious famine stung. 

Wildly screaming, rush'd between 

Fiercely fought the eagle-twain. 
Though by multitudes opprest, 

Till their little ones were slain, 
Till they perish'd on their nest. 

More unequal was the fray 

Which our band of brethren waged ; 
More insatiate o'er their prey 

Gaul's remorseless vultures raged. 

In innumerable waves 

Swoln with fury, grim with blood, 
Headlong roU'd the hordes of slaves, 

And engulf'd us with a flood. 

In the whirlpool of that flood, 

Firm in fortitude divine, 
Like the et;^rnal rocks we stood 

In the cataract of the Rhine 




f 



Till by tenfold force assail'd, 

In a hurricane of fire, 
When at length our phalanx fail'd, 

Then our courage blazed the higher. 

Broken into feeble bands, 

Fighting in dissever'd parts. 
Weak and weaker grew our hands, 

Strong and stronger still our hearts. 

Fierce amid the loud alarms. 

Shouting in the foremost fray, 
Children raised their little arms 

In their country's evil day. 

On their country's dying bed 

Wives and husbands ponr'd their breath; 
Many a youth and maiden bled, 

Married at thine altar. Death, ^^ 

Wildly scatter'd o'er the plain. 
Bloodier still the battle grew: — 

O ye spirits of the slain. 

Slain on those your prowess slew ! 

Who shall now your deeds relate ? 

Ye that fell, unwept, unknown ; 
Mourning for your country's fate, 

But rejoicing in your own ! 

Virtue, valour, nought avail'd 

With so merciless a foe ; 
When the nerves of heroes fail'd, 

Cowards then could strike a blow. 

Cold and keen the assassin's blade 
Smote the father to the ground ; 

Through the infant's breast convey'd 
To the mother's heart a wound.* 




Underwalden thus expired ; 

But at her expiring flame, 
With fraternal feeling fired, 

Lo ! a band of Switzers came.** 

From the steeps beyond the lake, 
Like a winter's weight of snow, 

When the huge lavanges break. 
Devastating all below ;^'' 

Down they rush'd with headlong might. 
Swifter than the panting wind ; 

All before them fear and flight ; 
Death and silence all behind. 

How the forest of the foe 

Bow'd before the thunder strokes, 
When they laid the cedars low. 

When they overwhelm'd the oaks ! 

Thus they hew'd their dreadful way; 

Till, by numbers forced to yield, 
Terrible in death they lay, 

The Avengers of the Field." 



PART IV. 

The JVanderer relates the Circumstances attending the Death of Albert. 

Shep. " Pledge the memory of the brave. 
And the spirits of the dead ; 
Pledge the venerable grave, 
Valour's consecrated bed. 

Wanderer ! cheer thy drooping soul ; 

This inspiring goblet take ; 
Drain the deep delicious bowl, 

For thy martyr'd brethren's sake." 



THE WANDERER OF SWITZERLAND. 

Wand. " Hail ! — all hail ! the patriot's grave, 
Valour's venerable bed : 
Hail ! the memory of the brave ; 
Hail ! the spirits of the dead. 

Time their triumphs shall proclaim, 
And their rich reward be this, — 

Immortality of fame. 
Immortality of bliss." 

Sliep. " On that melancholy plain. 
In that conflict of despair, 
How was noble Albert slain ? 

How didst thou, old warrior, fare ?" 

TVund. " In the agony of strife, 

Where the heart of battle bled. 
Where his country lost her life, 
Glorious Albert bow'd his head. 

When our phalanx broke away, 
And our stoutest soldiers fell, 

— Where the dark rocks dimm'd the day, 
Scowling o'er the deepest dell ; 

There, like lions old in blood, 
Lions rallying round their den, 

Albert and his warriors stood : 
We were iew, but we were men. 

Breast to breast we fought the ground. 
Arm to arm repell'd the foe : 

Every motion Avas a wound, 
And a death was every blow. 

Thus the clouds of sunset beam 
Warmer with expiring light; 

Thus autumnal meteors stream 

Redder through the darkening night. 

Miracles our champions wrought — 
Who their dying deeds shall tell ? 



THE WANDERER OF SWITZERLAND. 



Oh, how gloriously they fought ! 
How triumphantly they fell ! 

One by one gave up the ghost, 

Slain, not conquer'd, — they died free. 

Albert stood, — himself an host : 
Last of all the Swiss was he. 

So, when night, with rising shade, 
Climbs the Alps from steep to steep. 

Till in hoary gloom array'd 

All the giant-mountains sleep — 

High in heaven their monarch" stands 
Bright and beauteous from afar. 

Shining into distant lands 
Like a new created star. 

While I struggled through the fight, 
Albert was my sword and shield ; 

Till strange horror quench'd my sight. 
And I fainted on the field. 

Slow awakening from that trance, 
When my soul return'd to day, 

Vanish'd were the fiends of France, 
— But in Albert's blood I lay. 

Slain for me, his dearest breath 

On my lips he did resign ; 
Slain for me, he snatch'd his death 

From the blow that menaced mine. 

He had raised his dying head, 
And was gazing on my face ; 

As I woke — the spirit fled. 
But I felt his last embrace." 

Shep. "Man of suffering ! such a tale 

Would wring tears from marble eyes!" 
Wand. " Ha ! my daughter's cheek grows pale !" 
W. Wife. " Help, oh help ! my daughter dies !" 



66 


THE WANDERER OF bUITZERLAND. 




JVand. 


" Calm ihy transports, my wife ! 
Peace for these dear orphans' sake !" 




TV. mfi 


. "0 my joy, my hope, my life, 
my child, my child, awake !" 




Wand. 


" God ! God, whose goodness gives ; 






God ! whose Avisdom takes away ; 




Shep. 
Wand. 


Spare my child !" 




"Lives? — my daughter, didst thou say? 






God Almighty, on my knees, 






In the dust, will T adore 






Thine unsearchable decrees; 






— She was dead: — she lives once more." 




W. Dtr. 


"When poor Albert died, no prayer 
Call'd him back to hated life : 

Oh that I had perish'd there. 
Not his widow, but his wife !" 




Wand. 


" Dare my daughter thus repine ? 

Albert ! answer from above ; 
Tell me, — are these infants thine, 

Whom their mother does not love ?" 




W. Dtr 


" Does not love ! — my father hear ; 

Hear me, or my heart will break : 
Dear is life, but only dear 

For my parents', children's sake. 




V 


Bow'd to Heaven's mysterious will, 
I am worthy yet of you ; 

Yes ! — I am a mother still, 
Though I feel a Avidow too." 




Wand. 


"Mother, widow, mourner, all, 

All kind names in one,' — my child ; 

On thy faithful neck I fall ; 

Kiss me, — are we reconciled ?" 




W. Dtr 


"Yes, to Albert I appeal : 






Albert, answer from above. 





THE WANDERER OF SWITZERLAND. 



That my father's breast may feel 
All his daughter's heart of love." 

.S", Wife. " Faint and way-worn as they be 

With the day's long journey, sire, 
Let thy pilgrim family 

Now with me to rest retire." 

Wand. " Yes, the hour invites to sleep ; 
Till the morrow we must part : 
— Nay, my daughter, do not weep, 
Do not weep and break my heart. 

Sorrow-soothing sweet repose 
On your peaceful pillows light ; 

Angel-hands your eyelids close ; 
Dream of Paradise to-night." 



PART V. 

The Wanderer, being left alone with the Shepherd, relates his Adventures after the 
Battle of Underwalden. 

Shep. " When the good man yields his breath, 
(For the good man never dies,) 
Bright, beyond the gulf of death, 
Lo ! the land of promise lies. 

Peace to Albert's awful shade, 
In that land where sorrows cease ; 

And to Albert's ashes, laid 

In the earth's cold bosom, peace." 

Wand. " On the fatal field I lay 

Till the hour when twilight pale. 
Like the ghost of dying day, 

Wander'd down the darkening vale. 

Then in agony I rose. 

And with horror look'd around. 



THE WANDERER OF SWITZERLAND. 



Where embracing, friends and foes, 
Dead and dying, strcw'd the ground. 

Many a widow fix'd her eye. 

Weeping where her husband bled, 

Heedless though her babe was by. 
Prattling to his father dead. 

Many a mother, in despair 
Turning up the ghastly slain, 

Sought her son, her hero there, 
Whom she long'd to seek in vain. 

Dark the evening shadows roll'd 
On the eye that gleam'd in death ; 

And the evening-dews fell cold 
On the lip that gasp'd for breath. 

As I gazed, an ancient dame, 

— She was childless by her look — 

With refreshing cordials came: 
Of her bounty I partook. 

Then, with desperation bold, 
Albert's precious corpse I bore 

On these shoulders weak and old, 
Bow'd with misery before. 

Albert's angel gave me strength. 
As I stagger'd down the glen ; 

And I hid my charge at length 
In its wildest, deepest den. 

Then returning through the shade 
To the battle-scene, I sought, 

'Mongst the slain, an axe and spade ; — 
With such weapons Freemen fought. 

Scythes for swords our youth did wield 

In that execrable strife ; 
Ploughshares in that horrid field 

Bled with slaughter, breathed with life. 



In a dark and lonely cave, 

While the glimmering moon arose, 
Thus I dug my Albert's grave ; 

There his hallow'd limbs repose. 

Tears then, tears too long represt, 

Gush'd : — they fell like healing balm, 

Till the whirlwind in my breast 
Died into a dreary calm. 

On the fresh earth's humid bed, 
Where my martyr lay enshrined, 

This forlorn, unhappy head. 
Crazed Avith anguish, I reclined. 

But, while o'er my Aveary eyes 

Soothing slumbers seem'd to creep, 

Forth I sprang, with strange surprise. 
From the clasping arms of sleep. 

For the bones of Albert dead 

Heaved the turf with horrid throes, 

And his grave beneath my head 
Burst asunder ; — Albert rose ! 

' Ha ! my son — my son,' I cried, 

' Wherefore hast thou left thy grave ?' 

— ' Fly, my father,' — he replied ; 

' Save my wife — my children save.' — 

In the passing of a breath 

This tremendous scene was o'er : 

Darkness shut the gates of death. 
Silence seal'd them as before. 

One pale moment fix'd I stood 

In astonishment severe ; 
Horror petrified my blood, — 

I was wither'd up with fear. 

Then a sudden trembling came 
O'er my limbs ; I felt on fire, 



THE WANDERER OF SWITZERLAND. 



Burning, quivering like a flame 
In the instant to expire." 

Shep. " Rather like the mountain-oak, 
Tempest-shaken, rooted fast, 
Grasping strength from every stroke, 
While it wrestles with the blast." 

Wand. " Ay ! — my heart, unwont to yield, 

Quickly quell'd the strange affright, 
And undaunted o'er the field 
I began my lonely flight. 

Loud the gusty night-wind blew; — 
Many an awful pause between, 
j Fits of light and darkness flew 

I Wild and sudden o'er the scene. 

For the moon's resplendent eye 
Gleams of transient glory shed ; 

And the clouds, athwart the sky. 
Like a routed army fled. 

Sounds and voices fill'd the vale, 
Heard alternate loud and low; 

Shouts of victory swell'd the gale, 
But the breezes murmur' d wo. 

As I climb'd the mountain's side. 
Where the lake and valley meet, 

All my country's power and pride 
Lay in ruins at my feet. 

On that grim and ghastly plain 

Underwalden's heart-strings broke. 

When she saw her heroes slain. 
And her rocks receive the yoke. 



V 



On that plain, in childhood's hours, 
From their mothers' arms set free, 

Oft those heroes gather'd flowers. 
Often chased the wandering bee. 



TIIK WANDERER OF SWITZERLAND. 



ks. 



On that plain, in rosy youth, 

They had fed their fathers' flock , 

Told their love, and pledged their truth, 
In the shadow of those rocks. 

There, with shepherd's pipe and song. 

In the merry mingling dance, 
Once they led their brides along. 

Now! Perdition seize thee, France!" 



Shep. " Heard not Heaven the accusing cries 
Of the blood that smoked around, 
While the life-warm sacrifice 
Palpitated on the ground ?" 

Wand. " Wrath in silence heaps his store, 
To confound the guilty foe ; 
But the thunder will not roar 

Till the flash has struck the blow. 

Vengeance, vengeance will not stay ; 

It shall burst on Gallia's head. 
Sudden as the judgment-day 

To the unexpecting dead. 

From the Revolution's flood 
Shall a fiery dragon start ; 

He shall drink his mother's blood. 
He shall eat his father's heart. 

Nursed by anarchy and crime. 

He but distance mocks my sight ; 

O thou great avenger, TIME ! 

Bring thy strangest birth to light." 

Shep. " Prophet, thou hast spoken well, 
And I deem thy words divine : 
Now the mournful sequel tell 

Of thy country's woes and thine." 

Wand. " Though the moon's bewilder'd bark. 
By the m.id night tempest tost. 



THE WANDERER OF SWITZERLAND. 



In a sea of vapours dark, 
In a gulf of clouds was lost ; 

Still my journey I pursued, 
Climbing many a weary steep, 

Whence the closing scene I view'd 
With an eye that would not weep. 

Stantz — a melancholy pyre — 
And her hamlets blazed behind, 

With ten thousand tongues of fire. 
Writhing, raging in the wind. 

Flaming piles, where'er I turn'd, 
Cast a grim and dreadful light ; 

Like funereal lamps they burn'd 
In the sepulchre of night ; 

While the red illumined flood. 
With a hoarse and hollow roar, 

Seem'd a lake of living blood 
Wildly weltering on the shore. 

Midst the mountains far away, 
Soon I spied the sacred spot, 

Whence a slow consuming ray 
Glimmer'd from my native cot. 

At the sight my brain was fired, 

And afresh my heart's wounds bled ; 

Still I gazed : the spark expired — 

Nature seem'd extinct : — I fled. — 

Fled ; and, ere the noon of day, 
Reach'd the lonely goat-herd's nest, 

Where my wife, my children lay — 
Husband — father think the rest.' 



THK WANDERER OF SWITZERLAND. 



PART VI. 

The Wanderer informs the Shepherd that, after the example of many of his Coun- 
trymen flying from the Tyranny of France, it is bis intention to settle in some 
remote province of America. 

Shep. " Wanderer, whither wouldst thou roam ? 
To what region far away 
Bend thy steps to find a home, 
In the twilight of thy day ?" 

JVand. " In the twilight of my day 

I am hastening to the West ; 
There my weary limbs to lay, 
Where the sun retires to rest. 

Far beyond the Atlantic floods, 
Stretch'd beneath the evening sky, 

Realms of mountains, dark with woods. 
In Columbia's bosom lie. 

There, in glens and caverns rude. 

Silent since the world began. 
Dwells the virgin Solitude, 

Unbetray'd by faithless man ; 

Where a tyrant never trod. 

Where a slave was never known, 

But where Nature worships God 
In the wilderness alone ; 

— Thither, thither would I roam ; 

There my children may be free ; 
I for them will find a home. 

They shall find a grave for me. 

Though my father's bones afar 

In their native land repose. 
Yet beneath the twilight star 

Soft on mine the turf shall close. 



THE WANDERER OF SWITZERLAND. 



Though the mould that wraps my clay- 
When this storm of life is o'er, 

Never since creation lay 

On a human breast before ; — 

Yet in sweet communion there, 
When she follows to the dead. 

Shall my bosom's partner share 
Her poor husband's lowly bed. 

Albert's babes shall deck our grave, 
And my daughter's duteous tears 

Bid the flowery verdure wave 

Through the winter-waste of years." 

Shcp. "Long before thy sun descend, 

May thy woes and wanderings cease ; 
Late and lovely be thine end ; 

Hope and triumph, joy and peace ! 

As our lakes, at day's decline, 

Brighten through the gathering gloom. 

May thy latest moments shine 

Through the night-fall of the tomb." 

WasncL/" Though our parent perish'd here. 
Like the phoenix on her nest, 
Lo ! new-fledged her wings appear. 
Hovering in the golden West. 

Thither shall her sons repair. 
And beyond the roaring main 

Find their native country there. 
Find their Switzerland again. 

Mountains, can ye chain the will ? 

Ocean, canst thou quench the heart ? 
No ; I feel my country still, 

LIBERTY ! where'er thou art. 

Thus it was in hoary time. 

When our fathers sallied forth. 



THE WANDERER OF SWITZERLAND. 



Full of confidence sublime, 

From the famine-wasted North." 

' Freedom, in a land of rocks 

Wild as Scandinavia, give, 
Power Eternal ! — where our flocks 

And our little ones may live.' 

Thus they pray'd ; — a secret hand 
Led them, by a path unknown, 

To that dear delightful land 

Which I yet must call my own. 

To the vale of Switz they came : 

Soon their meliorating toil 
Gave the forests to the flame. 

And their ashes to the soil. 

Thence their ardent labours spread. 
Till above the mountain-snows 

Towering beauty show'd her head. 
And a new creation rose ! 

— So, in regions wild and wide. 
We will pierce the savage woods. 

Clothe the rocks in purple pride, 

Plough the valleys, tame the floods ;'— 

Till a beauteous inland isle. 

By a forest-sea embraced. 
Shall make Desolation smile 

In the depth of his own waste. 

There, unenvied and unknown. 
We shall dwell secure and free, 

In a country all our own. 
In a land of liberty." 

Shep. " Yet the woods, the rocks, the streams, 
Unbeloved, shall bring to mind. 
Warm with evening's purple beams, 
Dearer objects left behind ; — 



THE WANDERER OF SWITZERLAND. 



And thy native country's song, 

CaroU'd in a foreign clime, 
When new echoes shall prolong, 

— Simple, tender, and sublime ; — 

How will thy poor cheek turn pale, 

And, before thy banish'd eyes, 
Uxderwalden's charming vale. 

And thine own sweet cottage, rise !" 
TVand. " By the glorious ghost of TELL ; 

By Morcarthen's awful fray; 
By the field where Albert fell 

In thy last and bitter day ; 

Soul of Switzerland, arise ! 

Ha ! the spell has waked the dead : 

From her ashes to the skies 

Switzerland exalts her head. 

See the queen of mountains stand, 

In immortal mail complete, 
With the lightning in her hand. 

And the Alps beneath her feet. 

Hark ! her voice ; — ' My sons, awake ; 

Freedom dawns, behold the day: 
From the bed of bondage break, 

'Tis your mother calls, — obey.' 

At the sound, our fathers' graves. 
On each ancient battle-plain. 

Utter groans, and toss like waves 

When the wild blast sweeps the main. 

Rise, my brethren : cast away 

All the chains that bind you slaves: 

Rise, — your mother's voice obey, 
And appease your fathers' graves. 

Strike ! — the conflict is begun ; 
Freemen, soldiers, follow me. 



THE WANDERER OF SWITZERLAND. 



Shout ! — the victory is won, — 
Switzerland and Liberty !" 

Shep. " Warrior, warrior, stay thine arm ! 

Sheathe, oh sheathe thy frantic sword !' 
Wand. " Ah ! I rave — I faint : — the charm 

Flies, — and memory is restored. 

Yes, to agony restored, 

From the too transporting charm : — 
Sleep for ever, O my sword ! 

Be thou wither'd, O mine arm ! 

Switzerland is but a name t 

/^ Yet I feel, where'er I roam, 

That my heart is still the same, 
Switzerland is still my home." 



THE WEST INDIES. 



A POEM, IN FOUR PARTS. 



WKITTEN IN HONOUR OF THE ABOLITION OF THE AFRICAN SLAVE 
TRADE, BY THE BRITISH LEGISLATURE, IN 1807. 



"Receive him for ever; not now as a servant, hut above a servant,— a brotuer 
beloved."— St. Paul's Epist. to Phiiemon, v. 15, 16. 



This poem was undertaken at the request of Mr. Bowyer, in May, 1807. The 
author had not the resolution to forego an opportunity of being presented be- 
fore Ihe public, in a style of external magnificence which he would never have 
had the assurance to assume unsolicited. Though he is convinced that, were 
it proper to explain the private history of this work, he would be fully acquitted 
of presumption in having accepted the splendid invitation of the proprietor, yet 
he cannot help feeling that an appearance so superb, instead of prejudicing the 
public in his favour, will, in reality, only render him more obvious, and ob- 
noxious to criticism, if he be found unworthy of the situation in which he 
stands. Conscious, however, that he has exerted his utmost diligence and 
ability to do honour to his theme, and well aware that his poem can derive no 
lustre from the accompanying embellishments, unless it first casts a glory upon 
them, he thinks himself warranted to hope that it will be read and judged with 
the same indulgence, which, from past success, he believes it would have ex- 
perienced had it been produced in a form more becoming his pretensions as a 
man and a writer. 

There are objections against the title and plan of this piece, which will occur 
to almost every reader. The author will not anticipate them: he will only 
observe, that the title seemed the best, and the plan the most eligible, which he 
could adapt to a subject so various and excursive, yet so familiar and exhausted, 
as the African Slave Trade,— a subject which had become antiquated, by fre- 
quent, minute, and disgusting exposure; which afforded no opportunity to 
awaken, suspend, and delight curiosity, by a subtle and surprising development 
of plot ; and concerning which public feeling had been wearied into insensi- 
bility, by the agony of interest which the question excited, during three and 
twenty years of almost incessant discussion. That trade is at length abolished. 
May its memory be immortal, that henceforth it may be known only by its 
memory I 

Sheffield, December 1, 1808. 



THE WEST INDIES. 



PART I. 

Argument.— /(Production; on the Abolition of the Slave Trade— The Mariner's 
Compass— Columbus— The Discovery of America — The IVest Indian Islands — 
The Charibs — Their Extermination. 

" Thy chains are broken, Africa, be free !" 
Thus saith the island-empress of the sea ; 
Thus saith Britannia. O, ye winds and waves ! 
Waft the glad tidings to the land of slaves ; 
Proclaim on Guinea's coast, by Gambia's side, 
And far as Niger rolls his eastern tide,* 
Through radiant realms, beneath the burning zone, 
Where Europe's curse is felt, her name unknown, 
Thus saith Britannia, empress of the sea, 
" Thy chains are broken, Africa, be free !" 

Long lay the ocean-paths from man conceal'd ; 
Light came from heaven, — the magnet was reveal'd, 
A surer star to guide the seaman's eye 
Than the pale glory of the northern sky ; 
Alike ordain'd to shine by night and day, 
Through calm and tempest, with unsetting ray ; 
Where'er the mountains rise, the billows roll, 
Still with strong impulse turning to the pole. 
True as the sun is to the morning true. 
Though light as film, and trembling as the dew. 

Then man no longer plied, with timid oar 
And failing heart, along the windward shore ; 
Broad to the sky he turn'd his fearless sail. 
Defied the adverse, woo'd the favouring gale, 
Bared to the storm his adamantine breast, 
Or soft on ocean's lap lay down to rest ; 



While free, as clouds the liquid ether sweep, 
His white-wing'd vessels coursed the unbounded deep : 
From clime to cHme the wanderer loved to roam, 
The waves his heritage, the world his home. 

Then first Columbus, with the mighty hand 
Of grasping genius, weigh'd the sea and land ; 
The floods o'erbalanced : — where the tide of light, 
Day after day, roU'd down the gulf of night, 
There seem'd one waste of waters : — long in vain 
His spirit brooded o'er the Atlantic main ; 
When sudden, as creation burst from naught. 
Sprang a new world through his stupendous thought, 
Light, order, beauty ! — While his mind explored 
The unveiling mystery, his heart adored ; 
Where'er sublime imagination trod. 
He heard the voice, he saw the face of God. 

Far from the western cliffs he cast his eye 
O'er the wide ocean stretching to the sky : 
In calm magnificence the sun declined, 
And left a paradise of clouds behind : 
Proud at his feet, with pomp of pearl and gold, 
The billows in a sea of glory roll'd, 

" — Ah ! on this sea of glory might I sail. 
Track the bright sun, and pierce the eternal veil 
That hides those lands, beneath Hesperian skies, 
Where daylight sojourns till our morrow rise !" 

Thoughtful he wander'd on the beach alone ; 
Mild o'er the deep the vesper planet shone, 
The eye of evening, brightening through the west 
Till the sweet moment when it shut to rest : 
•' Whither, O golden Venus ! art thou fled ? 
Not in the ocean-chambers lies thy bed ; 
Round the dim world thy glittering chariot drawn 
Pursues the twilight, or precedes the dawn ; 
Thy beauty noon and midnight never see, 
The morn and eve divide the year with thee." 

Soft fell the shades, till Cynthia's slender bow 
Crested the farthest wave, then sunk below: 



"Tell me, resplendent guardian of the night, 
Circling the sphere in thy perennial flight, 
What secret path of heaven thy smiles adorn. 
What nameless sea reflects thy gleaming horn?" 

Now earth and ocean vanish'd, all serene 
The starry firmament alone was seen ; 
Through the slow, silent hours, he watch'd the host 
Of midnight suns in western darkness lost. 
Till Night himself, on shadowy pinions borne. 
Fled o'er the mighty waters, and the morn 
Danced on the mountains: — "Lights of heaven!" he cried, 
" Lead on ; — I go to win a glorious bride ; 
Fearless o'er gulfs unknown I urge my way. 
Where peril prowls, and shipwreck lurks for prey : 
Hope swells my sail; — in spirit I behold 
That maiden world, twin-sister of the old, 
By nature nursed beyond the jealous sea, 
Denied to ages, but betroth'd to me."'^ 

The winds were prosperous, and the billows bore 
The brave adventurer to the promised shore ; 
Far in the west, array'd in purple light, 
Dawn'd the new world on his enraptured sight: 
Not Adam, loosen'd from the encumbering earth, 
Waked by the breath of God to instant birth. 
With sweeter, wilder wonder gazed around. 
When life within and light Avithout he found ; 
When, all creation rushing o'er his soul, 
He seem'd to live and breathe throughout the whole. 
So felt Columbus, when, divinely fair. 
At the last look of resolute despair, 
The Hesperian isles, from distance dimly blue, 
With gradual beauty open'd on his view. 
In that proud moment, his transported mind 
The morning and the evening worlds combined, 
And made the sea, that sunder'd them before, 
A bond of peace, uniting shore to shore. 

Vain, visionary hope ! rapacious Spain 
FoUow'd her hero's triumph o'er the main. 



Tilt; Wl.ST INDIES. 



Her hardy sons, in fields of battle tried, 

Where Moor and Christian desperately died, 

A rabid race, fanatically bold, 

And steel'd to cruelty by lust of gold, 

Traversed the waves, the unknown world explored, 

The cross their standard, but their faith the sword ; 

Their steps were graves; o'er prostrate realms they trod : 

They worshipp'd Mammon while they vow'd to God. 

Let nobler bards in loftier numbers tell 
How Cortez conquer'd, Montezuma fell; 
How fierce Pizarro's ruffian arm o'erthrevv 
The sun's resplendent empire in Peru ; 
How, like a prophet, old Las Casas stood, 
And raised his voice against a sea of blood, 
Whose chilling waves recoil'd while he foretold 
His country's ruin by avenging gold. 
— That gold, for which unpitied Indians fell. 
That gold, at once the snare and scourge of hell. 
Thenceforth by righteous Heaven was doom'd to shed 
Unmingled curses on the spoiler's head ; 
For gold the Spaniard cast his soul away, — 
His gold and he were every nation's prey. 

But themes like these would ask an angel-lyre, 
Language of light, and sentiment of fire ; 
Give me to sing, in melancholy strains. 
Of Charib martyrdoms and Negro chains ; 
One race by tyrants rooted from the earth. 
One doom'd to slavery by the taint of birth ! 

Where first his drooping sails Columbus furl'd 
And sweetly rested in another world. 
Amidst the heaven-reflecting ocean, smiles 
A constellation of elysian isles; 
Fair as Orion when he mounts on high. 
Sparkling with midnight splendour from the sky: 
They bask beneath the sun's meridian rays. 
When not a shadow breaks the boundless blaze ; 
The breath of ocean wanders through their vales 
In morning breezes and in evening gales : 




Earth from her lap perennial verdure pours, 
Ambrosial fruits, and amaranthine flowers; 
O'er the wild mountains and luxuriant plains, 
Nature in all the pomp of beauty reigns, 
In all the pride of freedom. — Nature free 
Proclaims that Man Avas born for liberty. 
She flourishes where'er the sunbeams play 
O'er living fountains, sallying into day; 
She Avithers where the waters cease to roll, 
And night and winter stagnate round the pole : 
Man too, where freedom's beams and fountains rise. 
Springs from the dust, and blossoms to the skies ; 
Dead to the joys of light and life, the slave 
Clings to the clod ; his root is in the grave : 
Bondage is winter, darkness, death, despair: 
Freedom the sun, the sea, the mountains, and the air ! 

In placid indolence supinely blest, 
A feeble race these beauteous isles possess'd ; 
Untamed, untaught, in arts and arms unskill'd, 
Their patrimonial soil they rudely till'd. 
Chased the free rovers of the savage wood, 
Ensnared the wild-bird, swept the scaly flood , 
Shelter'd in lowly huts their fragile forms 
From burning suns and desolating storms ; 
Or when the halcyon sported on the breeze, 
In light canoes they skimm'd the rippling seas ; 
Their lives in dreams of soothing languor flew, 
No parted joys, no future pains they knew, 
The passing moment all their bliss or care ; 
Such as their sires had been the children were. 
From afre to age ; as waves upon the tide 
Of stormless time, they calmly lived and died. 

Dreadful as hurricanes, athwart the main, 
Rush'd the fell legions of invading Spain ; 
With fraud and force, with false and fatal breath, 
(Submission bondage, and resistance death,) 
They swept the isles. In vain the simple race 
Kneel'd to the iron sceptre of their grace. 



THE WEST INBIES. 



Or with weak arms their fiery vengeance braved ; 

They came, they saw, they conquer'd, they enslaved, 

And they destroy'd ; — the generous heart they broke, 

They crush'd the timid neck beneath the yoke ; 

Where'er to battle march'd their fell array, 

The sword of conquest plough'd. resistless way; 

Where'er from cruel toil they sought repose, 

Around the fires of devastation rose. 

The Indian, as he turn'd his head in flight. 

Beheld his cottage flaming through the night. 

And, midst the shrieks of murder on the wind, 

Heard the mute blood-hound's death-step close behind. 

The conflict o'er, the valiant in their graves. 
The wretched remnant dwindled into slaves ; 
Condemn'd in pestilential cells to pine. 
Delving for gold amidst the gloomy mine. 
The suflerer, sick of life-protracting breath, 
Inhaled with joy the fire-damp blast of death ; 
— Condemn'd to fell the mountain palm on high. 
That cast its shadow from the evening sky, 
Ere the tree trembled to his feeble stroke, 
The woodman languish'd, and his heart-strings broke ; 
— Condemn'd in torrid noon, with palsied hand, 
To urge the slow plough o'er the obdurate land. 
The labourer, smitten by the sun's quick ray, 
A corpse along the unfinish'd furrow \ay. 
O'erwhelm'd at length with ignominious toil. 
Mingling their barren ashes with the soil, 
Down to the dust the Charib people pass'd, 
Like autumn foliage withering in the blast : 
The whole race sunk beneath the oppressor's rod. 
And left a blank among the works of God. 




PART II. 

AiUiUMENT.— r/ie Cane — ifrica—The J^egro—The Slave-carrying Trade— The 
Means and Resources of the Slave Trade — The Portuguese, Dutch, Danes, 
French, and English in America. 

Among the bowers of paradise, that graced 

Those islands of the world-dividing waste, 

AVhere towering cocoas waved their graceful locks. 

And vines luxuriant cluster'd round the rocks ; 

Where orange-groves perfumed the circling air, 

With verdure, flowers, and fruit for ever fair; 

Gay myrtle-foliage track'd the winding rills, 

And cedar forests slumber'd on the hills ; 

— An eastern plant, engrafted on the soil,^ 

Was till'd for ages with consuming toil ; 

No tree of knowledge with forbidden fruit. 

Death in the taste, and ruin at the root ; 

Yet in its growth were good and evil found, — 

It bless'd the planter, but it cursed the ground 

While with vain wealth it gorged the master's hoard. 

And spread with manna his luxurious board. 

Its culture was perdition to the slave, — 

It sapp'd his life, and flourish'd on his grave. 

When the fierce spoiler from remorseless Spain 
Tasted the balmy spirit of the cane, 
(Already had his rival in the west 
From the rich reed ambrosial sweetness press'd,) 
Dark through his thoughts the miser purpose roU'd 
To turn its hidden treasures into gold. 
But at his breath, by pestilent decay. 
The Indian tribes were swiftly swept away ; 
Silence and horror o'er the isles were spread. 
The living seem'd the spectres of the dead. 
The Spaniard saw ; no sigh of pity stole, 
No pang of conscience touch'd his sullen soul: 
The tiger weeps not o'er the kid ; — he turns 
His flashing eyes abroad, and madly burns 



For nobler victims, and for warmer blood : 
Thus on the Charib shore the tyrant stood, 
Thus cast his eyes with fury o'er the tide, 
And far beyond the gloomy gulf descried 
Devoted Africa: he burst away, 
And with a yell of transport grasp'd his prey. 

Where the stupendous Mountains of the Moon 
Cast their broad shadows o'er the realms of noon ; 
From rude Caffraria, Avhere the giraffes browse. 
With stately heads among the forest boughs, 
To Atlas, where Numidian lions glow 
With torrid fire beneath eternal snow : 
From Nubian hills, that hail the dawning day. 
To Guinea's coast, where evening fades away, 
Regions immense, unsearchable, unknown, 
Bask in the splendour of the solar zone ; 
A world of wonders, — where creation seems 
No more the works of Nature, but her dreams ; 
Great, wild, and beautiful, beyond control, 
She reigns in all the freedom of her soul; 
Where none can check her bounty when she showers 
O'er the gay wilderness her fruits and flowers ; 
None brave her fury, when, with whirlwind breath 
And earthquake step, she Avalks abroad with death : 
O'er boundless plains she holds her iiery flight. 
In terrible magnificence of light; 
At blazing noon pursues the evening breeze. 
Through the dun gloom of realm-o'ershadowing trees. 
Her thirst at Nile's mysterious fountain quells, 
Or bathes in secrecy where Niger swells 
An inland ocean, on whose jasper rocks 
With shells and sea-flower wreaths she binds her locks 
She sleeps on isles of velvet verdure, placed 
Midst sandy gulfs and shoals for ever waste ; 
She guides her countless flocks to cherish'd rills ; 
And feeds her cattle on a thousand hills ; 
Her steps the wild bees welcome through the vale. 
From every blossom that embalms the gale ; 



THE WEST INDIES. 



The slow unwieldy river-horse she leads 

Through the deep waters, o'er the pasturing meads ; 

And climbs the mountains that invade the sky, 

To soothe the eagle's nestlings when they cry. 

At sunset, when voracious monsters burst 

From dreams of blood, awaked by maddening thirst ; 

When the lorn caves, in which they shrunk from light, 

Ring with wild echoes through the hideous night; 

When darkness seems alive, and all the air 

Is one tremendous uproar of despair. 

Horror, and agony ; — on her they call ; 

She hears their^clamour, she provides for all, 

Leads the light leopard on his eager way, 

And goads the gaunt hysena to his prey. 

In these romantic regions man grows wild : 
Here dwells the Negro, nature's outcast child, 
Scorn'd by his brethren ; but his mother's eye. 
That gazes on him from her warmest sky, 
Sees in his flexile limbs untutor'd grace, 
Power on his forehead, beauty in his face ; 
Sees in his breast, where lawless passions rove. 
The heart of friendship and the home of love; 
Sees in his mind, where desolation reigns, 
Fierce as his clime, uncultured as his plains, 
A soil where virtue's fairest flowers might shoot, 
And trees of science bend with glorious fruit ; 
Sees in his soul, involved with thickest night. 
An emanation of eternal light, 
Ordain'd, midst sinking worlds, his dust to fire. 
And shine for ever when the stars expire. 
Is he not man, though knowledge never shed 
Her quickening beams on his neglected head? 
Is he not man, though sweet religion's voice 
Ne'er made the mourner in his God rejoice ? 
Is he not man, by sin and suffering tried ? 
Is he not man, for whom the Saviour died ? 
Behe the Negro's powers : — in headlong will. 
Christian ! thy brother thou shall prove him still ! 



THE WEST INDIES. 



Belie his virtues ; since his wrongs began, 

His follies and his crimes have stampt him Man. 

The Spaniard found him such: — the island-race 
His foot had spurn'd from earth's insulted face ; 
Among the waifs and foundlings of mankind, 
Abroad he look'd, a sturdier stock to find ; 
A spring of life, whose fountains should supply 
His channels as he drank the rivers dry : 
That stock he found on Afric's swarming plains, 
That spring he open'd in the negro's veins ; 
A spring, exhaustless as his avarice drew, 
A stock that like Prometheus' vitals grew 
Beneath the eternal beak his heart that tore. 
Beneath the insatiate thirst that drain'd his gore. 
Thus, childless as the Charibbeans died, 
Afric's strong sons the ravening waste supplied ; 
Of hardier fibre to endure the yoke, 
And self-renew'd beneath the severing stroke ; 
As grim oppression crush'd them to the tomb. 
Their fruitful parent's miserable womb 
Teem'd with fresh myriads, crowded o'er the waves, 
Heirs to their toil, their sufferings, and their graves. 

Freighted with curses was the bark that bore 
The spoilers of the west to Guinea's shore ; 
Heavy with groans of anguish blew the gales 
That swell'd that fatal bark's returning sails ; 
Old Ocean shrunk as o'er his surface flew 
The human cargo and the demon crew. 
— Thenceforth, unnumber'd as the waves that roll 
From sun to sun, or pass from pole to pole, 
Outcasts and exiles, from their country torn, 
In floating dungeons o'er the gulf were borne; 
— The valiant, seized in peril-daring fight; 
The weak, surprised in nakedness and night ; 
Subjects by mercenary despots sold ; 
Victims of justice prostitute for gold ; 
Brothers by brothers, friends by friends betray'd ; 
Snared in her lover's arms the trusting maid; 



The faithful wife b}'^ her false lord estranged, 
For one wild cup of drunken bliss exchanged; 
From the brute-mother's knee, the infant boy, 
Kidhapp'd in slumber, barter'd for a toy; 
The father, resting at his father's tree, 
Doom'd by the son to die beyond the sea : 
— All bonds of kindred, law, alliance broke, 
All ranks, all nations crouching to the yoke ; 
From fields of light, unshadow'd climes, that lie 
Panting beneath the sun's meridian eye ; 
From hidden Ethiopia's utmost land ; 
From Zaara's fickle wilderness of sand ; 
From Congo's blazing plains and blooming woods ; 
From Whidah's hills, that gush with' golden floods ; 
Captives of tyrant power and dastard wiles, 
Dispeopled Africa, and gorged the isles. 
Loud and perpetual o'er the Atlantic waves, 
For guilty ages, roll'd the tide of slaves ; 
A tide that knew no fall, no turn, no rest, 
Constant as day and night from east to west; 
Still widening, deepening, swelling in its course, 
With boundless ruin and resistless force. 

Quickly, by Spain's alluring fortune fired, 
With hopes of fume, and dreams of wealth inspired, 
Europe's dread powers from ignominious ease 
Started ; their pennons stream'd on every breeze : 
And still where'er the wide discoveries spread. 
The cane was planted, and the native bled ; 
While, nursed by fiercer suns, of nobler race, 
The negro toil'd and perish'd in his place. 

First, Lusitania, — she whose prows had borne 
Her arms triumphant round the car of morn, 
— Turn'd to the settitig sun her bright array, 
And hung her trophies o'er the couch of day. 

Holland, — whose hardy sons roll'd back the sea, 
To build the halcyon-nest of liberty. 
Shameless abroad the enslaving flag unfurl'd. 
And reign'd a despot in the younger world. 



THE WKST INDIES. 



Denmark, — whose roving hordes, in barbarous tin 
Fill'd the wide North with piracy and crimes, 
Awed cA'ery shore, and taught their keels to sweep 
O'er every sea, the Arabs of the deep, 
— Embark'd, once more to western conquest led 
By RoUo's spirit, risen from the dead. 

Gallia, — who vainly aim'd, in depth of night. 
To hurl old Rome from her Tarpeian height, 
(But lately laid, with unprevented blow, 
The thrones of kings, the hopes of freedom Ioav,) 
— Rush'd o'er the theatre of splendid toils, 
To brave the dangers and divide the spoils. 

Britannia, — she who scathed the crest of Spain, 
And won the trident sceptre of the main. 
When to the raging wind and ravening tide 
She gave the huge Armada's scatter'd pride, 
Smit by the thunder-wielding hand that hurl'd 
Her vengeance round the wave-encircled world; 
— Britannia shared the glory and the guilt, — 
By her were slavery's island-altars built. 
And fed with human victims ;>^while the cries 
Of blood demanding vengeance from the skies, 
Assail'd her traders' grovelling hearts in vain, 
— Hearts dead to sympathy, alive to gain. 
Hard from impunity, with avarice cold. 
Sordid as earth, insensible as gold. 

Thus through a night of ages, in whose shade 
The sons of darkness plied the infernal trade. 
Wild Africa beheld her tribes, at home. 
In battle slain ; abroad, condemn'd to roam 
O'er the salt waves, in stranger-isles to bear, 
(Forlorn of hope, and sold into despair,) 
Through life's slow journey, to its dolorous close, 
Unseen, unwept, unutterable woes. 



THE WEST INDIES. 



PART III. 

AnoUMENT.— 77te Love of Country, and of Itome, the same in all ^g-es and among 
all JVations — The JVegro's Hume and Countrij — Muniro Park — Progress of the 
Slave Trade— The Middle Passage— The JVegro in the (Vest Indies— The Guinea 
Captain — The Creole Planter— The Moors of Barbary — Buccaneers— Maroons — 
St. Domingo — Hurricanes — The Yellow Fever. 

There is a land, of every land the pride, 

Beloved by Heaven o'er all the world beside; 

Where brighter suns dispense serener light, 

And milder moons emparadise the night; 

A land of beauty, virtue, valour, truth, 

Time-tutor'd age, and love-exalted youth ; 

The wandering mariner, whose eye explores 

The wealthiest isles, the most enchanting shores, 

Views not a realm so bountiful and fair. 

Nor breathes the spirit of a purer air ; 

In every clime the magnet of his soul, 

Touch'd by remembrance, trembles to that pole ; 

For in this land of Heaven's peculiar grace, 

The heritage of nature's noblest race. 

There is a spot of earth supremely blest, 

A dearer, sweeter spot than all the rest, ' 

Where man, creation's tyrant, casts aside 

His sword and sceptre, pageantry and pride, 

While in his soften'd looks benignly blend 

The sire, the son, the husbaaid, brother, friend: 

Here woman reigns ; the mother, daughter, wife, 

Strews with fresh flowers the narrow way of life ; 

In the clear heaven of her delightful eye. 

An angel-guard of loves and graces lie ; 

Around her knees domestic duties meet. 

And fire-side pleasures gambol at her feet. 

"Where shall that land, that spot of earth be found?" 

Art thou a man ? — a patriot ? — look around ; 

Oh, thou shalt find, howe'er thy footsteps roam, 

That land thy country, and that spot thy home! 



THE WEST INDIES. 



On Greenland's rocks, o'er rude Kamschatka's plains, 
In pale Siberia's desolate domains; 
When the wild hunter takes his lonely way, 
Tracks through tempestuous snows his savage prey, 
The reindeer's spoil, the ermine's treasure shares. 
And feasts his famine on the fat of bears ; 
Or, wrestling with the might of raging seas, 
Where round the pole the eternal billows freeze, 
Plucks from their jaws the stricken whale, in vain 
Plunging down headlong through the whirling main ; 
— His w^astes of ice are lovelier in his eye 
Than all the flowery vales beneath the sky; 
And dearer far than Caesar's palace-dome. 
His cavern-shelter, and his cottage-home. 

O'er China's garden-fields and peopled floods; 
In California's pathless world of woods; 
Round Andes' heights, where Winter, from his throne. 
Looks dovv^n in scorn upon the summer zone ; 
By the gay borders of Bermuda's isles, 
Where spring with everlasting verdure smiles ; 
On pure Madeira's vine-robed hills of health ; 
In Java's swamps of pestilence and wealth ; 
Where Babel stood, where wolves and jackals drink. 
Midst weeping willows, on Euphrates' brink ; 
On Carmel's crest ; by Jordan's reverend stream, 
Where Canaan's glories vanish'd like a dream ; 
Where Greece, a spectre, haunts her heroes' graves. 
And Rome's vast ruins darken Tiber's waves ; 
Where broken-hearted Switzerland bewails 
Her subject mountains and dishonour'd vales ; 
Where Albion's rocks exult amidst the sea. 
Around the beauteous isle of liberty ; 
— Man, through all ages of revolving time. 
Unchanging man, in every varying clime. 
Deems his own land of every land the pride. 
Beloved by Heaven o'er all the world beside ; 
His home the spot of earth su-premely blest, 
A dearer, sweeter spot than all the rest. 



THE WEST INDIES. 

And is the Negro outlaw'd from his birth ? 
Is he alone a stranger on the earth ? 
Is there no shed, whose peeping roof appears 
So lovely that it fills his eyes Avith tears ? 
No land, whose name, in exile heard, will dart 
Ice through his veins, and lightning through his heart ? 
Ah ! yes ; beneath the beams of brighter skies. 
His home amidst his father's country lies ; 
There with the partner of his soul he shares 
Love-mingled pleasures, love-divided cares : 
There as with nature's warmest filial fire. 
He soothes his blind, and feeds his helpless sire ; 
His children sporting round his hut behold 
How they shall cherish him when he is old, 
Train'd by example from their tenderest youth 
To deeds of charity and words of truth.* 
— Is he not blest ? Behold, at closing day, 
The negro-village swarms abroad to play ; 
He treads the dance through all its rapturous rounds. 
To the wild music of barbarian sounds ; 
Or, stretch'd at ease, where broad palmettos shower 
Delicious coolness in his shadowy bower, 
He feasts on tales of witchcraft, that give birth 
To breathless wonder, or ecstatic mirth : 
Yet most delighted, when, in rudest rhymes 
The minstrel wakes the song of elder times, 
When men were heroes, slaves to beauty's charms. 
And all the joys of life were love and arms. 
— Is not the Negro blest ? His generous soil 
With harvest-plenty crowns his simple toil; 
More than his wants his flocks and fields afford : 
He loves to greet the stranger at his board : 
"The winds were roaring, and the White Man fled, 
The rains of night descended on his head ; 
The poor White Man sat down beneath our tree, 
Weary and faint, and far from home was he ; 
For him no mother fills with milk the bowl. 
No wife prepares the bread to cheer his soul ; 



THE WEST INDIES. 



— Pity the poor White Man who sought our tree, 

No wife, no mother, and no home has he." 

Thus sang- the Negro's daughters ; — once again, 

Oh that the poor White Man might hear that strain ! 

— Whether the victim of the treacherous Moor, 

Or from the Negro's hospitable door 

Spurn'd as a spy from Europe's hateful clime, 

And left to perish for thy country's crime ; 

Or destined still, when all thy wanderings cease, 

On Albion's lovely lap to rest in peace ; 

Pilgrim ! in heaven or earth, where'er thou be, 

Angels of mercy guide and comfort thee ! 

Thus lived the Negro in his native land. 
Till Christian cruisers anchor'd on his strand : 
Where'er their grasping arms the spoilers spread, 
The Negro's joys, the Negro's virtues fled; 
Till, far amidst the wilderness unknown. 
They flourish'd in the sight of Heaven alone : 
While from the coast, with wide and wider sweep, 
The race of Mammon dragg'd across the deep 
Their sable victims, to that western bourn, 
From which no traveller might e'er return, 
To blazon in the ears of future slaves 
The secrets of the world beyond the waves. 

When the loud trumpet of eternal doom 
Shall break the mortal bondage of the tomb , 
When with a mother's pangs the expiring earth 
Shall bring her children forth to second birth ; 
Then shall the sea's mysterious caverns, spread 
With human relics, render up their dead : 
Though warm with life the heaving surges glow 
Where'er the winds of heaven were wont to blow, 
In sevenfold phalanx shall the rallying hosts 
Of ocean slumberers join their wandering ghosts, 
Along the melancholy gulf, that roars 
From Guinea to the Charibbean shores. 
Myriads of slaves, that perish'd on the way. 
From age to age the shark's appointed prey, 



THE WEST INDIES. 



By livid plagues, by lingering tortures slain, 
Or headlong plunged alive into the main. 
Shall rise in judgment from their gloomy beds. 
And call down vengeance on their murderers' heads 

Yet small the number, and the fortune blest, 
(^f those w-ho in the stormy deep found rest, 
Weigh'd with the unremember'd millions more, 
That 'scaped the sea to perish on the shore. 
By the slow pangs of solitary care. 
The earth-devouring anguish of despair. 
The broken heart, which kindness never heals, 
The home-sick passion which the Negro feels, 
When toiling, fainting in the land of canes, 
His spirit wanders to his native plains ; 
His little lovely dwelling there he sees. 
Beneath the shade of his paternal trees. 
The home of comfort : — then before his eyes 
The terrors of captivity arise. 

— 'Twas night ; — his babes around him lay at rest, 
Their mother slumber'd on their father's breast: 
A yell of murder rang around their bed ; 
They woke ; their cottage blazed ; the victims fled ; 
Forth sprang the ambush'd ruffians on their prey. 
They caught, they bound, they drove them far away; 
The white man bought them at the mart of blood ; 
In pestilential barks they cross'd the flood ; 
Then were the wretched ones asunder torn, 
To distant isles, to separate bondage borne. 
Denied, though sought with tears, the sad relief 
That misery loves, — the fellowship of grief. 
The Negro, spoil'd of all that nature gave 
To freeborn man, thus shrunk into a slave. 
His passive limbs, to measured tasks confined, 
Obey'd the impulse of another mind ; 
A silent, secret, terrible control. 
That ruled his sinews, and repress'd his soul. 
Not for himself he waked at morning-light, 
Toil'd the long day, and sought repose at night; 



His rest, his labour, pastime, strength, and health, 
Were only portions of a master's wealth ; 
His love — oh, name not love, where Britons doom 
The fruit of love to slavery from the womb ! 

Thus spurn'd, degraded, trampled, and oppress'd. 
The Negro-exile languish'd in the West, 
With nothing left of life but hated breath 
And not a hope except the hope in death, 
To fly for ever from the Creole-strand, 
And dwell a freeman in his father-land. 

Lives there a savage ruder than the slave ? 
— Cruel as death, insatiate as the grave, 
False as the winds that round his vessel blow, 
Remorseless as the gulf that yawns below. 
Is he who toils upon the wafting flood, 
A Christian broker in the trade of blood ; 
Boisterous in speech, in action prompt and bold, 
He buys, he sells, — he steals, he kills, for gold 
At noon, when sky and ocean, calm and clear, 
Bend round his bark, one blue unbroken sphere ; 
When dancing dolphins sparkle through the brine. 
And sunbeam circles o'er the waters shine : 
He sees no beauty in the heaven serene, 
No soul-enchanting sweetness in the scene, 
But, darkly scowling at the glorious day, 
Curses the winds that loiter on their way. 
When swoln with hurricanes the billows rise, 
To meet the lightning midway from the skies ; 
When from the unburden'd hold his shrieking slaves 
Are cast, at midnight, to the hungry waves ; 
Not for his victims strangled in the deeps. 
Not for his crimes the harden'd pirate weeps. 
But grimly smiling, when the storm is o'er. 
Counts his sure gains, and hurries back for more. 

Lives there a reptile baser than the slave ? 
— Loathsome as death, corrupted as the grave. 
See the dull Creole, at his pompous board. 
Attendant vassals crinofin"- round their lord : 



THE \Vi:ST INDIES. 

Satiate with food, his heavy eyelids close, 

Voluptuous minions fan him to repose; 

Prone on the noonday couch he lolls in vain, 

Delirious slumbers rock his maudlin brain ; 

He starts in horror from bewildering dreams ; 

His bloodshot eye with fire and frenzy gleams : 

He stalks abroad ; through all his wonted rounds, 

The Negro trembles, and the lash resounds. 

And cries of anguish, shrilling through the air, 

To distant fields his dread approach declare. 

Mark, as he passes, every head declined ; 

Then slowly raised, — to curse him from behind. 

This is the veriest wretch on nature's face, 

Own'd by no country, spurn'd by every race ; 

The tether'd tyrant of one narrow span, 

The bloated vampire of a living man ; 

His frame, — a fungous form, of dunghill birth. 

That taints the air, and rots above the earth ; 

His soul ; — has he a soul, whose sensual breast 

Of selfish passions is a serpent's nest ? 

Who follows, headlong, ignorant, and blind. 

The vague, brute instinct of an idiot mind ; 

Whose heart midst scenes of suffering senseless grown. 

E'en from his mother's la,p was chill'd to stone ; 

Whose torpid pulse no social feelings move ; 

A stranger to the tenderness of love. 

His motley haram charms his gloating eye. 

Where ebon, brown, and olive beauties vie ; 

His children, sprung alike from sloth and vice. 

Are born his slaves, and loved at market price : 

Has he a soul ? — With his departing breath, 

A form shall hail him at the gates of death. 

The spectre Conscience, — shrieking through the gloom, 

"Man, we shall meet again beyond the tomb." 

O Africa ! amidst thy children's woes. 
Did earth and heaven conspire to aid thy foes? 
No, thou hadst vengeance. — From thy northern shores 
Sallied thejawless corsairs of the Moors, 



THE WEST INDIES. 



And back on Europe's guilty nations hurl'd 
Thy wrongs and sufferings in the sister world : 
Deep in thy dungeons Christians clank'd their chains, 
Or toil'd and perish'd on thy parching plains. 

But where thine offspring crouch'd beneath the yoke, 
In heavier peals the avenging thunder broke. 
— Leagued with rapacious rovers of the main, 
Hayti's barbarian hunters harass'd Spain, 
A mammoth race, invincible in might. 
Rapine and massacre their dire delight. 
Peril their element ; — o'er land and flood 
They carried fire, and quench'd the flames with blood; 
Despairing captives hail'd them from the coasts ; 
They rush'd to conquest, led by Charib ghosts. 

Tremble, Britannia ! while thine islands tell 
The appalling mysteries of Obi's spell ; 
The wild Maroons, impregnable and free, 
Among the mountain-holds of liberty, 
Sudden as lightning darted on their foe, 
Seen hke the flash, remember'd like the blow. 

While Gallia boasts of dread Marengo's fight. 
And Hohenlinden's slaughter-deluged night, 
Her spirit sinks ; — the sinews of the brave 
That crippled Europe, shrunk before the slave ; 
The demon-spectres of Domingo rise, 
And all her triumphs vanish from her eyes. 

God is a Spirit, veil'd from human sight, 
In secret darkness of eternal light ; 
Through all the glory of his works we trace 
The hidings of his counsel and his face ; 
Nature, and time, and change, and fate fulfil. 
Unknown, unknowing, his mysterious will ; 
Mercies and judgments mark him, every hour, 
Supreme in grace, and infinite in power : 
Oft o'er the Eden-islands of the West, 
In floral pomp and verdant beauty drest. 
Roll the dark clouds of his awaken'd ire : 
—Thunder and earthquake, whirlwind, flood, and fire. 



THK WKST INDIES. 



Midst reeling' mountains and disparting plains, 

Tell the pale world — "The God of vengeance reigns. 

Nor in the majesty of storms alone, 
The Eternal makes his dread displeasure known; 
At his command the pestilence abhorr'd 
Spares the poor slave, and smites the haughty lord ; 
While to the tomb he sees his friend consign'd, 
Forebodino- melancholy sinks his mind, 
Soon at his hearty he feels the monster's fangs, 
They tear his vitals with convulsive pangs: 
The light is anguish to his eye, the air 
Sepulchral vapours laden with despair; 
Now frenzy-horrors rack his whirling brain, 
Tremendous pulses throb through every vein ; 
The firm earth shrinks beneath his torture-bed. 
The sky in ruins rushes o'er his head ; 
He rolls, he rages in consuming fires. 
Till nature, spent with agony, expires. 



PART IV. 

Argument.— TAe Moravian Brethren— Their Missions in Greenland, J^Torth Ame- 
rica, and the West Indies— Christian J^'egroes — The Advocates of the M'ejroes in 
England — Granville Sharpe — Clarkson — Wilherforce — Pitt — Fox. — The JVation 
itself— The Abolition of the Slave Trade— The future State of the West Indies— 
Of Africa— Of the Whole World— The Millennium. 

Was there no mercy, mother of the slave ! 

No friendly hand to succour and to save, 

W^hile commerce thus thy captive tribes oppress'd. 

And lowering vengeance linger'd o'er the west? 

Yes, Africa ! beneath the stranger's rod 

They found the freedom of the sons of God. 

When Europe languish'd in barbarian gloom, 
Beneath the ghostly tyranny of Rome, 
Whose second empire, cowl'd and mitred, burst 
A phoenix from the ashes of the first ; 
From Persecution's piles, by bigots fired, 
Amonsr Bohemian mountains Truth retired ; 



Tin-: WEST INDIES. 



There, midst rude rocks, in lonely glens obscure, 

She found a people scattered, scorn'd, and poor, 

A little flock through quiet valleys led, 

A Christian Israel in the desert fed. 

While ravening wolves, that scorn'd the shepherd's hand. 

Laid waste CTod's heritage through every land. 

With these the lovely exile sojourn'd long ; 

Soothed by her presence, solaced by her song, 

They toil'd through danger, trials, and distress, 

A band of Virgins in the wilderness, 

With burning lamps, amid their secret bowers. 

Counting the watches of the weary hours, 

In patient hope the Bridegroom's voice to hear. 

And see his banner in the clouds appear: 

But when the morn returning chased the night. 

These stars, that shone in darkness, sunk in light : 

Luther, like Phosphor, led the conquering day, 

His meek forerunners waned, and pass'd away.* 

Ages roll'd by, the turf perennial bloom'd 
O'er the lorn relics of those saints entomb'd ; 
No miracle proclaim'd their power divine, 
No kings adorn'd, no pilgrims kiss'd their shrine ; 
Cold and forgotten in the grave they slept : 
But God remember'd them : — their Father kept 
A faithful remnant ; — o'er their native clime 
His Spirit moved in his appointed time ; 
The race revived at his almighty breath, 
A seed to serve him, from the dust of death. 

"Go forth, my sons, through heathen realms proclaim 
Mercy to sinners in a Saviour's name :" 
Thus spake the Lord ; they heard, and they obey'd : 
— Greenland lay wrapt in nature's heaviest shade ; 
Thither the ensign of the cross they bore ; 
The gaunt barbarians met them on the shore ; 
With joy and wonder hailing from afar. 
Through polar storms, the light of Jacob's star. 

Where roll Ohio's streams, Missouri's floods, 
Beneath the umbrao-e of eternal woods, 



THE WEST INDIES. 



The Red Man roam'd, a hunter-warrior wild ; 

On him the everlasting Gospel smiled; 

His heart was awed, confounded, pierced, subdued. 

Divinely melted, moulded, and renew'd ; 

The bold, base savage, nature's harshest clod, 

Rose from the dust the image of his God. 

And thou, poor Negro ! scorn'd of all mankind ; 
Thou dumb and impotent, and deaf and blind ; 
Thou dead in spirit ! toil-degraded slave, 
Crush'd by the curse on Adam to the grave ; 
The messengers of peace, o'er land and sea, 
That sought the sons of sorrow, stoop'd to thee. 
— The captive raised his slow and sullen eye ; 
He knew no friend, nor deem'd a friend was nigh, 
Till the sweet tones of Pity touch'd his ears, 
And Mercy bathed his bosom with her tears : 
Strange were those tones, to him those tears were strange ; 
He wept and wonder'd at the mighty change. 
Felt the quick pang of keen compunction dart, 
And heard a still small whisper in his heart, 
A voice from heaven, that bade the outcast rise 
From shame on earth to glory in the skies. 

From isle to isle the welcome tidings ran ; 
The slave that heard them started into man : 
Like Peter, sleeping in his chains, he lay, — 
The angel came, his night was turn'd to day; 
"Arise !" his fetters fall, his slumbers flee ; 
He wakes to life, he springs to liberty. 

No more to demon-gods, in hideous forms. 
He pray'd for earthquakes, pestilence, and storms, 
In secret agony devour'd the earth. 
And, while he spared his mother, cursed his birth: 
To Heaven the Christian Negro sent his sighs, 
In morning vows and evening sacrifice ; 
He pray'd for blessings to descend on those 
That dealt to him the cup of many woes ; 
Thought of his home in Africa forlorn ; 
Yet, while he wept, rejoiced that he was born. 



THE WEST INDIES. 



No longer burning- with unholy fires 
I He wallow'd in the dust of base desires ; 

Ennobling virtue fix'd his hopes above, 
Enlarged his heart, and sanctified his love ; 
With humble steps the paths of peace he trod, 
A happy pilgrim, for he walk'd with God. 

Still slowly spread the dawn of life and day. 
In death and darkness pagan myriads lay : 
Stronger and heavier chains than those that bind 
The captive's limbs, enthrall'd his abject mind ; 
The yoke of man his neck indignant bore, 
The yoke of sin his willing spirit wore. 

Meanwhile, among the great, the brave, the free. 
The matchless race of Albion and the sea. 
Champions arose to plead the Negro's cause ; 
In the wide breach of violated laws. 
Through which the torrent of injustice roU'd, 
They stood : — with zeal unconquerably bold. 
They raised their voices, stretch'd their arms to save 
From chains the freeman, from despair the slave ; 
The exile's heart-sick anguish to assuage, 
And rescue Afric from the spoiler's rage. 
She, miserable mother, from the shore. 
Age after age beheld the barks that bore 
Her tribes to bondage : — with distraction wrung. 
Wild as the lioness that seeks her young. 
She flash'd unheeded lightnings from her eyes; 
Her inmost deserts echoing to her cries ; 
Till agony the sense of suffering stole, 
And stern unconscious grief benumb'd her soul. 
So Niobe, when all her race were slain. 
In ecstacy of wo forgot her pain : 
Cold in her eye serenest sorrow shone. 
While pitying Nature soothed her into stone. 

Thus Africa, entranced with sorrow, stood. 
Her fix'd eye gleaming on the restless flood : 
— When Sharpe, on proud Britannia's charter'd shore, 
From Libyan limbs the unsanction'd fetters tore. 



THE WEST INDIES. lOt 

And taught the world, that while she rules the waves, 

Her soil is freedom to the feet of slaves : 

— When Clarkson his victorious course began, 

Unyielding in the cause of God and man, 

Wise, patient, persevering to the end. 

No guile could thwart, no power his purpose bend ; 

He rose o'er Afric like the sun in smiles, — 

He rests in glory on the western isles : 

— When Wilberforce, the minister of grace. 

The new Las Casas of a ruin'd race," 

With angel-might opposed the rage of hell, 

And fought like Michael, till the dragon fell : 

— "When Pitt, supreme amid the senate, rose 

The Negro's friend, among the Negro's foes ; 

Yet while his tones like heaven's high thunder broke 

No fire descended to consume the yoke : 

— When Fox, all-eloquent, for freedom stood, 

With speech resistless as the voice of blood. 

The voice that cries through all the patriot's veins, 

When at his feet his country groans in chains ; 

The voice that" whispers in the mother's breast, 

When smiles her infant in his rosy rest ; 

Of power to bid the storm of passion roll. 

Or touch with sweetest tenderness the soul. 

He spake in vain ; — till, with his latest breath, 

He broke the spell of Africa in death. 

The Muse to whom the lyre and lute belong. 
Whose song of freedom is her noblest song, 
The lyre with awful indignation swept. 
O'er the sweet lute in silent sorrow wept, 
— When Albion's crimes drew thunder from her tongue, 
— When Afric's woes o'erwhelm'd her while she sung. 
Ijamented Cowper ! in thy path I tread ; 
O I that on me were thy meek spitit shed ! 
The woes that Avring my bosom once were thine; 
Be all thy virtues, all thy genius, mine ! 
Peace to thy soul ! thy God thy portion be ; 
And in his presence may I rest with thee ! 



THE WEST INDIES. 



Quick at the call of Virtue, Freedom, Truth, 
Weak withering Age and strong aspiring Youth 
Alike the expanding power of Pity felt; 
The coldest, hardest hearts began to melt; 
From breast to breast the flame of justice glow'd ; 
Wide o'er its banks the Nile of mercy flow'd ; 
Through all the isle the gradual waters swell'd; 
Mammon in vain the encircling flood repell'd ; 
O'erthrown at length, like Pharaoh and his host. 
His shipwreck'd hopes lay scatter'd round the coast. 

High on her rock in solitary state, 
Sublimely musing, pale Britannia sate; 
Her awful forehead on her spear reclined. 
Her robe and tresses streaming with the wind ; 
Chill through her frame foreboding tremors crept : 
The Mother thought upon her sons, and wept: 
— She thought of Nelson in the battle slain. 
And his last signal beaming o'er the main ;* 
In Glory's circling arms the hero bled. 
While Victory bound the laurel on his head ; 
At once immortal, in both worlds, became 
His soaring spirit and abiding name ; 
— She thought of Pitt, heart-broken on his bier; 
And, " O my country !" echoed in her ear ; 
— She thought of Fox; — she heard him faintly speak, 
His parting breath grew cold upon her cheek, 
His dying accents trembled into air; 
" Spare injured Africa ! the Negro spare !" 

She started from her trance ! — and round the shore, 
Beheld her supplicating sons once more 
Pleading the suit so long, so vainly tried, 
Renew'd, I'esisted, promised, pledged, denied, 
The Negro's claim to all his Maker gave, 
And all the tyrant ravish'd from the slave. 
Her yielding heart confess'd the righteous claim, 
Sorrow had soften'd it, and love o'ercame ; 



•England expects every man to do his duty." 



THE WEST INDIES. 



Shame flush'd her noble cheek, her bosom burn'd ; 
To helpless, hopeless Africa she turn'd ; 
She saw her sister in the mourner's face. 
And rush'd with tears into her dark embrace : 
" All hail !" exclaim'd the empress of the sea, — 
" Thy chains are broken — Africa, be free !" 

Muse ! take the harp of prophecy : — behold ! 
The glories of a brighter age unfold: 
Friends of the outcast ! view the accomplish'd plan, 
The Negro towering to the height of man. 
The blood of Romans, Saxons, Gauls, and Danes, 
Swell'd the rich fountain of the Briton's veins; 
Unmingled streams a Avarmer life impart, 
And quicker pulses to the Negro's heart: 
A dusky race, beneath the evening sun. 
Shall blend their spousal currents into one : 
Is beauty bound to colour, shape, or air? 
No ; God created all his offspring fair : 
Tj'rant and slave their tribes shall never see, 
For God created all his offspring free ; 
Then Justice, leagued with Mercy, from above, 
Shall reign in all the liberty of love ; 
And the sweet shores beneath the balmy west 
Again shall be " the islands of the blest." 

Unutterable mysteries of fate 
Involve, O Africa ! thy future state. 
— Oil Niger's banks, in lonely beauty wild, 
A Negro-mother carols to her child : 
" Son of my widow'd love, my orphan joy ! 
Avenge thy father's murder, O my boy!" 
Along those banks the fearless infant slra^'us, 
Bathes in the stream, among the eddies prays ; 
See the boy bounding through the eager race ; 
The fierce youth, shouting foremost in the chase. 
Drives the grim lion from his ancient woods. 
And smites the crocodile amidst his floods : 
To giant strength in unshorn manhood grown 
He haunts the wilderness, he dwells alone. 



THE WEST INDIES. 



A tigress Avith her whelps to seize him sprung ; 

He tears the mother, and he tames the young 

In the drear cavern of their native rock: 

Thither wild slaves and fell banditti flock ; 

He heads their hordes ; they burst, like torrid rains, 

In death and devastation o'er the plains ; 

Stronger and bolder grows his ruffian band, 

Prouder his heart, more terrible his hand. 

He spreads his banner: crowding from afar. 

Innumerable armies rush to war ; 

Resistless as the pillar'd whirlwinds fly 

O'er Libyan sands revolving to the sky. 

In fire and wrath through every realm they run, 

Where the noon-shadow shrinks beneath the sun ; 

Till at the Conqueror's feet, from sea to sea, 

A hundred nations bow the servile knee, 

And throned in nature's unreveal'd domains, 

The Jenghis Khan of Africa he reigns. 

Dim through the night of these tempestuous years 
A Sabbath dawn o'er Africa appears ; 
Then shall her neck from Europe's yoke be freed. 
And healing arts to hideous arms succeed; 
At home fraternal bonds her tribes shall bind, 
Commerce abroad espouse them Avith jnankind ; 
While Truth shall build, and pure Religion bless, 
The Church of God amidst the wilderness. 

Nor in the isles and Africa alone 
Be the Redeemer's cross and triumph known: 
Father of Mercies ! speed the promised hour; 
Thy kingdom come with all-restoring power; 
Peace, virtue, knowledge, spread from pole to pole, 
As round the world the ocean-waters roll ! 
—Hope waits the morning of celestial light; 
Time plumes his wings for everlasting flight ; 
Unchanging seasons have their march begun ; 
Millennial years are hastening to the sun ; 
Seen through thick clouds, by Faith's transpiercing eyes, 
The New Creation shines in purer skies. 






THE WEST INDIES. 



— All hail ! — the age of crime and suffering ends ; 
The reign of righteousness from heaven descends ; 
Vengeance for ever sheathes the afflicting sword ; 
Death is destroy 'd, and Paradise restored ; 
Man, rising from the ruins of his fall, 
Is one with God, and God is All in All. 



u 



PREFACE. 



There is no authentic history of tlie world from the Creation to the Welnpe, 
besides tlnit which is found in the first cliapters of Genesis. He, therefure, who 
fixes the date of a fictitious narrative within that period, is under olilig-ation to 
no other authority whatever for conformity of manners, events, or even locali- 
ties: he has full power to accommodate these to his peculiar purposes, observ- 
ins only such analogy as shall cotisist with the brief information, contained in 
the sacred records, concerning mankind in the earliest ages. The present writer 
acknowledges, that he has exercised this uniioubted right with great free- 
dom. Success alone sanctions bold innovation ; if he has succeeded in what he 
has attempted, he will need no arguments to justify it; if he has miscarried, 
none will avail him. Those who imagine that he has exhibited the antedilu- 
vians as more skilful in arts and arms than can be supposed, in their stage of 
society, may read the Eleventh Book of Paradise Lost ;— and those who think 
he has made the religion of the Patriarchs too evangelical, may read the Twelfth. 

With respect to the personages and incidents of his story, the Author having 
deliberately adopted them, under the conviction, that in the characters of the 
one he was not stepping out of human nature, and in the construction of the 
other not exceeding the limits of poetical probability, — he asks no favour, he 
deprecates no censure, on behalf of either ; nor shall the facility with which 
" much malice and a little wit" might turn into ridicule every line that lie has 
written, deter him from leaving the whole to the mercy of general Readers. 

But,— here is a large web of fiction involving a small fact of Scripture ! No- 
thing could justify a work of this kind, if it were, in any way, calculated to 
impose on the credulity, pervert the principles, or corrupt the affections of its 
approvers. Here, then, the appeal lies to conscience rather than to taste, and 
the decision on this point is of infinitely more importance to the Poet than his 
name among men, or his interests on earth. It was his design, in this compo- 
sition, to present a similitude of events, that might be imagined to have hap- 
pened in the first age of the world, in which such Scripture-characters as are 
introduced would probably have acted and spoken as they are here made to act 
and speak. The story is' told as a parable only; and its value, in this view, 
must l>e determined by its moral, or rather by its religious, influence on the 
mind and on the heart. Fiction though it be, it is the fiction that represents 
Truth; and that is Truth,— Truth in the essence, though not in the name; 
Truth in the spirit, though not in the letter. 



No place having been found, in Asia, to, correspond exactly with the Mosaic 
description of the site of Paradise, the Author has disregarded both the leanied 
and the absurd hypotheses on the subject; and at once imagining an inaccessi- 
ble tract of land, at the confluence of four rivers, which after their junction take 
the name of the largest, and become the Euphrates of the ancient world, lie has 
placed "the happy garden" there. Milton's noble fiction of the Mount of Para- 
dise being removed by the Deluge, and push'd 

*' Down the great river lo the opening gulf," 

and there converted into a barren isle, implies such a change in the water- 
courses as will, poetically at least, account for the difference between the scene 
of this story and the presei^t face of the country at the point where the Tigris 
and Euphrates meet. On the eastern side of these waters, the Author supposes 
the descendants of the younger children of Adam to dwell, possessing the land 
of Eden: the rest of the world having been gradually colonized by emigrants 
from these, or peopled by the posterity of Cain. In process of tinie. after the 
Sons of God had formed connections with the daughtersof men, and there were 
Giants in the earth, the latter assumed to be Lords and Rulers over mankind, 
till among tlipinselves arose One, excelling all his brethren in knowledge and 
power, wlio hi ( amc lluir King, and by their aid, in the course of a long life, 
subdued all the iiili.iliited earth, except the land of Eden. This land, at the 
head of a mijlity army, principally composed of the descendants of Cain, he 
has iiivndiil ami ((niiiuered, even to the banks of Euphrates, at the opening of 
the action of the Poem. It is only necessary to add, that, for the sake of dis- 
tinction, the invaders are frequently denominated from Cain, as "the host of 
Cain," — "the force of Cain," — "the camp of Cain ;"— and the remnant of the 
defenders of Eden are, in like manner, denominated from Eden. — The Jews 
have an ancient tradition, that some of the Giants, at the Deluge, tied to the 
top of a high mountain, and escaped the ruin that involved the rest of their 
kindred. In the tenth Canto of the following Poem, a hint is borrowed from 
this tradition, but it is made to yield to the superior authority of Scripture- 
testimony. 
1813. 



no 



THE 



WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



A POEM, IN TEN C.-VNTOS. 



TO THE SPIRIT OF A DEPARTED FRIEND.^ 



Many, my friend, have mourn'd for Thee, 

And yet shall many mourn, 
Long as thy name on earth shall be 

In sweet remembrance borne. 
By those who loved Thee here, and love 
Thy spirit still in realms above. 

For while thine absence they deplore, 
'Tis for themselves they weep : 

Though they behold thy face no more. 
In peace thine ashes sleep, 

And o'er the tomb they lift their eye, 

— Thou art not dead, Thou couldst not die 

In silent anguish, O my friend! 

When I recall thy worth, 
Thy lovely life, thine early end, 

I feel estranged from earth ; 
My soul with thine desires to rest. 
Supremely and for ever blest. 

In loftier mood I fain would raise 

With my victorious breath 
Some fair memorial of thy praise. 

Beyond the reach of Death ; 
Proud wish, and vain ! — I cannot give 
The word, that makes the dead to live. 

Thou art not dead. Thou couldst not die; 
To nobler life new-born. 



* Daniel Parken, Esq., of Lincoln's Inn, a friend to whose critical taste Mr. 
Montgomery acknowledges himself to have been indebted while writing The 
West Indies, and the earlier parts of this poem. He died before The World be- 
fore the Flood was finished. 



10* 



the; avorld before the flood. 



Thou look'st in pity from the sky 

Upon a world forlorn, 
Where glory is but dying flame, 
And immortality a name. 

Yet didst Thou prize the Poet's art; 

And when to Thee I sung. 
How pure, how fervent from the heart, 

The language of thy tongue ! 
In praise or blame alike sincere, 
But still most kind when most severe. 

When first this dream of ancient times 
Warm on my fancy glow'd. 

And forth in rude spontaneous rhymes 
The Song of Wonder flow'd ; 

Pleased but alarm'd, I saw Thee stand. 

And check'd the fury of my hand. 

That hand with awe resumed the lyre, 
I trembled, doubted, fear'd. 

Then did thy voice my hope inspire, 
My soul thy presence cheer'd ; 

But suddenly the light was flown, 

I look'd, and found myself alone. 



Alone, in sickness, care, and wo, 

Since that bereaving day, 
With heartless patience, faint and low, 

I trill'd the secret lay. 
Afraid to trust the bold design 
To less indulgent ears than thine. 

'Tis done; — nor would I dread to meet 
The World's repulsive brow. 

Had I presented at thy feet 
The Muse's trophy now. 

And gain'd the smile I long'd to gain, 

The pledge of labour not in vain. 



TO THE SPIRIT OF A DEPARTED FRIEND. 



Full well I know, if Thou wert here, 

A pilgrim still with me, — 
Dear as my theme was once, and dear 

As I was once to Thee, — 
Too mean to yield Thee pure delight. 
The strains that now the world invite. 

Yet could they reach Thee ichere Thou art, 
And sounds might spirits move. 

Their better, their diviner part 
Thou surely wouldst approve ; 

Though heavenly thoughts are all thy joy, 

And angel-songs thy tongue employ. 

My task is o'er; and I have wrought 

With self-rewarding toil 
To raise the scatter'd seed of thought 

Upon a desert soil : 

for soft winds and clement showers ! 

1 seek not fruit, I planted flowers. 

Those flowers I train'd, of many a hue, 

Along thy path to bloom. 
And little thought that 1 must strew 

Their leaves upon thy tomb : 
— Beyond that tomb I lift mine eye, 
Thou art not dead. Thou couldst not die. 

Farewell, but not a long farewell ; 

In heaven may I appear, 
The trials of my faith to tell 

In thy transported ear. 
And sing with Thee the eternal strain, 
"Worthy the Lamb that once was slain." 

Sheffield, January 23, 1S13. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



CANTO FIRST. 

The Invasion of Eden by the Descendants of Cain — The Flight ofJavan from the 
Camp of the Invaders to the Valley where the Patriarchs dwelt — The Story of 
Javan's former Life. 

Eastward of Eden's early peopled plain, 

When Abel perish'd by the hand of Cain, 

The murderer from his Judge's presence fled : 

Thence to the rising sun his offspring spread ; 

But he, the fugitive of care and guilt, 

Forsook the haunts he chose, the homes he built ; 

While filial nations hail'd him Sire and Chief, 

Empire nor honour brought his soul relief; 

He found, Avhere'er he roam'd, uncheer'd, unblest. 

No pause from suffering, and from toil no rest. 

Ages, meanwhile, as ages now are told. 
O'er the young Avorld in long succession roll'd ; 
For such the vigour of primeval man. 
Through number'd centuries his period ran. 
And the first Parents saw their hardy race. 
O'er the green wilds of habitable space, 
By tribes and kindred, scatter'd wide and far. 
Beneath the track of every varying star. 
But, as they multiplied from clime to clime, 
Embolden'd by their elder brother's crime. 
They spurn'd obedience to the Patriarch's yoke, 
The bonds of Nature's fellowship they broke ; 
The weak became the victims of the strong. 
And Earth Avas fill'd with violence and wrong. 

Yet long on Eden's fair and fertile plain 
A righteous nation dwelt, that knew not Cain: 
There fruits and flowers, in genial light and dew. 
Luxuriant vines, and golden harvests grew; 



W 



THf: WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



By freshening- waters flocks and cattle stray'd, 
While youth and childhood watch'd them from the shade ; 
Age, at his fig-tree, rested from his toil. 
And man))'- vigour till'd the unfailing soil ; 
Green sprang the turf, by holy footsteps trod, 
Round the pure altars of the living God ; 
Till foul Idolatry those altars stain'd, 
And lust and revelry through Eden reign'd. 
Then fled the people's glor}?- and defence, 
The joys of home, the peace of innocence ; 
Sin brought forth sorrows in perpetual birth, 
And the last light from heaven forsook the earth, 
Save in one forest-glen, remote and wild. 
Where yet a ray of lingering mercy smiled. 
Their quiet course where Seth and Enoch ran. 
And God and angels deign'd to walk with man. 
Now from the east, supreme in arts and arms, 
The tribes of Cain, awakening war-alarms. 
Full in the spirit of their father, came 
To waste their brethren's lands with sword and flame. 
In vain the younger race of Adam rose, 
With force unequal, to repel their foes ; 
Their fields in blood, their homes in ruins lay, 
Their whole inheritance became a prey; 
The stars, to whom as gods they raised their cry. 
Roll'd, heedless'of their offerings, through the sky; 
Till, urged on Eden's utmost bounds at length. 
In fierce despair, they rallied all their strength. 
They fought, but they were vanquish'd in the fight. 
Captured, or slain, or scatter'd in the flight : 
The morning battle-scene at eve was spread 
With ghastly heaps, the dying and the dead; 
The dead unmourn'd, unburied left to lie. 
By friends and foes, the dying left to die. 
The victim, Avhile he groan'd his soul away, 
Heard the gaunt vulture hurrying to his prey, 
Then strengthless felt the ravening beak, that tore 
His widen'd wounds, and drank the living gore. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 






One sole surviving remnant, void of fear, 
Woods in their front, Euphrates in their rear, 
Were sworn to perish at a glorious cost, 
For all they once had known, and loved, and lost; 
A small, a brave, a melancholy band. 
The orphans and the childless of the land. 
The hordes of Cain, by giant-chieftains led. 
Wide o'er the north their vast encampments spread: 
A broad and sunny champaign stretch'd between ; 
Westward a maze of waters girt the scene ; 
There on Euphrates, in its ancient course. 
Three beauteous rivers roll'd their confluent force, 
Whose streams, while man the blissful garden trod, 
Adorn'd the earthly paradise of God ; 
But since he fell, within their triple bound. 
Fenced a long region of forbidden ground ; 
Meeting at once, where high athwart their bed 
Repulsive rocks a curving barrier spread. 
The embattled floods, by mutual whirlpools crost. 
In hoary foam and surging mist were lost ; 
Thence, like an Alpine cataract of snow, 
White down the precipice they dash'd below; 
There, in tumultuous billows broken wide, 
They spent their rage, and yoked their fourfold tide ; 
Through one majestic channel, calm and free. 
The sister-rivers sought the parent sea. 

The midnirrht watch was ended ; — down the west 
The glowing moon declined towards her rest; 
Tlirough either host the voice of war was dumb ; 
In dreams the hero won the fight to come ; 
No sound was stirring, save the breeze that bore 
The distant cataract's everlasting roar, 
When, from the tents of Cain, a youth withdrew; 
Secret and swift, from post to post he flew, 
And pass'd the camp of Eden, while the dawn 
C41eam'd faintly o'er the interjacent lawn ; 
Skirting ihe forest, cautiously and slow, 
He fear'd at every step to start a foe ; 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD, 



Oft leap'd the hare across his path, up sprung 

The lark beneath his feet, and soaring sung: 

What time, o'er eastern mountains seen afar, 

With golden splendour rose the morning-star, 

As if an Angel-sentinel of night. 

From earth to heaven had wing'd his homeward flight,- 

Glorious at first, but lessening by the way. 

And lost insensibly in higher day. 

From track of man and herd his path he chose, 
Where high the grass, and thick the copse wood rose ; 
Then by Euphrates' banks his course inclined, 
Where the gray Avillows trembled to the wind ; 
With toil and pain their humid shade he clear'd 
When at the porch of heaven the sun appear'd, 
Through gorgeous clouds that streak'd the orient sky, 
And kindled into glory at his eye ; 
While dark amidst the dews that glitter'd round. 
From rock and tree, long shadows traced the ground. 
Then climb'd the fugitive an airy height. 
And resting, back o'er Eden cast his sight. 

Far on the left, to man for ever closed. 
The Mount of Paradise in clouds reposed : 
The gradual landscape open'd to his view; 
From Nature's face the veil of mist withdrew, 
And left, in clear and purple light reveal'd, 
The radiant river and the tented field ; 
The black pine-forest, in whose girdle lay 
The patriot phalanx, hemm'd in close array; 
The verdant champaign narrowing to the north, 
Whence from their dusky quarters sallied forth 
The proud Invaders, early roused to fight. 
Tribe after tribe emerging into light ; 
Whose shields and lances, in the golden beams 
Flash'd o'er the restless scene their flickering gleams. 
As when the breakers catch the morning glow, 
And ocean rolls in living fire below ; 
So, round the unbroken border of the wood. 
The Giants pour'd their army like a flood, 



THK WORLD BEFORF. THE FLOOD. 



Eager to force the covert of their foe, 
And lay the last defence of Eden low. 

From that safe eminence, absorb'd in thought, 
Even till the wind the shout of legions brought. 
He gazed, — his heart rccoil'd, — he turn'd his head. 
And o'er the southern hills his journey sped. 

Who was the fugitive ? — In infancy 
A youthful Mother's only hope was he. 
Whose spouse and kindred, on a festal day. 
Precipitate destruction swept away ; 
Earth trembled, open'd, and entonib'd them all; 
She saw them sinking, heard their voices call 
Beneath the gulf, — and agonized, aghast, 
On the wild verge of eddying ruin cast, 
Felt in one pang, at that convulsive close, 
A Widow's anguish, and a Mother's throes : 
A Babe sprang forth, an inauspicious birth, 
Where all had perish'd that she loved on earth, 
Forlorn and helpless, on the upriven ground, 
The parent, with her offspring, Enoch found: 
And thence with lender care and timely aid. 
Home to the Patriarchs' glen his charge convey'd. 

Restored to life, one pledge of former joy. 
One source of bliss to come, remain'd — her boy! 
Sweet in her eye the cherish'd infant rose. 
At once the seal and solace of her woes ; 
When the pale widow clasp'd him to her breast, 
Warm gush'd the tears, and would not bereprest; 
In lonely anguish, when the truant child 
Leap'd o'er the threshold, all the mother smiled.. 
In him, while fond imagination view'd 
Husband and parents, brethren, friends renew'd, 
Each vanish'd look, each well-remember'd grace. 
That pleased in them, she sought in Javan's face ; 
For quick his eye and changeable its ray. 
As the sun glancing through a vernal day; 
And like the lake, by storm or moonlight seen, 
With darkenina: furrows o'er cerulean mien, 



\ 



THE WOULD BKTORE THE I'LOOD. 



His countenance, the mirror of his breast. 
The cahn or trouble of his soul express'd. 

As years enlarged his form, in moody hours 
His mind betray'd its weakness with its powers; 
Alike his fairest hopes and strangest fears 
Were nursed in silence, or divulged with tears : 
The fulness of his heart repress'd his tongue. 
Though none might rival Javan when he sung. 
He loved, in lonely indolence reclined, 
To watch the clouds and listen to the wind, 
But from the north when snow and tempest came, 
His nobler spirit mounted into flame ; 
With stern delight he roam'd the howling woods. 
Or hung in ecstasy o'er headlong floods. 
Meanwhile excursive fancy long'd to vieAV 
The world, which yet b}?- fame alone he knew ; 
The joys of freedom were his daily theme, 
Glory the secret of his midnight dream ; 
That dream he told not ; though his heart would ache. 
His home was precious for his mother's sake. 
With her the lowly paths of peace he ran. 
His guardian angel, till he verged to man ; 
But when her weary eye could watch no more. 
When to the grave her timeless corse he bore, 
Not Enoch's counsels could his steps restrain; 
He fled, and sojourn'd in the land of Cain. 
There, when he heard the voice of Jubal's lyre, 
Instinctive genius caught the ethereal fire ; 
And soon, with sAveetly-modulating skill. 
He learn'd to wind the passions at his will, 
To rule the chords with such mysterious art. 
They seem'd the life-strings of the hearer's heart. 
Then Glory's opening field he proudly trod. 
Forsook the worship and the ways of God, 
Round the vain world pursued the phantom Fame, 
And cast away his birthright for a name. 

Yet no delight the Minstrel's bosom knew, 
None save the tones that from his heart he drew. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



And the warm visions of a wayward mind, 

Whose transient splendour left a gloom behind, 

Frail as the clouds of sunset, and as fair, 

Pageants of light resolving into air. 

The world, whose charms his young affections stole, 

He found too mean for an immortal soul; 

Wound with his life, through all his feelings wrought, 

Death and eternity possess'd his thought ; 

Remorse impell'd him, unremitting care 

Harass'd his path, and stung him to despair. 

Still was the secret of his griefs unknown, 

Amidst the universe he sigh'd alone; 

The fame he folio w'd and the fame he found, 

Heal'd not his heart's immedicable wound ; 

Admired, applauded, crown'd where'er he roved. 

The Bard was homeless, friendless, unbeloved. 

All else that breath'd below the circling sky 

Were link'd to earth by some endearing tie ; 

He only, like the ocean-weed uptorn. 

And loose along the world of waters borne, 

Was cast companionless, from wave to wave, 

On life's rough sea, — and there was none to save. 

The Giant King, who led. the hosts of Cain, 
Delighted in the Minstrel and. his vein ; 
No hand, no voice, like Javan's could control, 
With soothing concords, his tempestuous soul, 
With him the wandering Bard, who found no rest 
Through ten years' exile, sought his native west ; 
There from the camp retiring, he pursued 
His journey to the Patriarchs' solitude. 
This son of pence no martial armour wore, 
A scrip for food, a staff in hand he bore ; 
Flaxen his robe ; and o'er his shoulder hung, 
Broad as a warrior's shield, his harp unstrung, 
A shell of tortoise, exquisitely wrought 
With hieroglyphics of embodied thought : 
.Tubal himself enchased the polish'd frame ; 
And Javan won it in the strife for fame 




Among the sons of Music, when their Sire 
To his victorious skill adjudged the lyre. 

'Twas noon, when Javan climb'd the bordering hill, 
By many an old remembrance hallow'd still, 
Whence he beheld, by sloping woods enclosed, 
The hamlet where his Parent's dust reposed, 
His home of happiness in early years. 
And still the home of all his hopes and fears, 
When from ambition struggling to break free, 
He mused on joys and sorrows yet to be. 
Awhile he stood, with rumination pale. 
Casting an eye of sadness o'er the vale. 
When, suddenly abrupt, spontaneous prayer 
Burst from his lips for One who sojourn'd there ; 
For One, whose cottage, far appearing, dreAv, 
Even from his Mother's grave, his transient view : 
One, whose unconscious smiles were wont to dart 
Ineffable emotion through his heart ; 
A nameless sympathy, more sweet, more dear 
Than friendship, solaced him Avhen she was near, 
And well he guess'd, while yet a timorous boy, 
That Javan's artless songs were Zillah's joy. 
But when ambition, with a fiercer flame 
Than untold love, had fired his soul for fame, 
This infant passion, cherish'd yet represt, 
Lived in his pulse, but died within his breast ; 
For oft in distant lands, when hope beat high, 
Westward he turn'd his eager glistening eye. 
And gazed in spirit on her absent form. 
Fair as the moon emerging through the storm. 
Till sudden, strange, bewildering horrors cross'd 
His thought, — and every glimpse of joy was lost 
Even then, when melancholy numb'd his brain, 
And life itself stood still in every vein. 
While his cold, quivering lips sent vows above, 
— Never to curse her with his bitter love ! 
His heart, espoused with hers, in secret sware 
To hold its truth unshaken by despair : 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



The vows dispersed that from those lips were borne, 
But never, never was that heart forsworn ; 
Throughout the world, the charm of Zillah's name 
Repell'd the touch of every meaner flame. 
Jealous and watchful of the sex's wiles, 
He trembled at the light of woman's smiles ! 
So turns the mariner's mistrusting eye 
From proud Orion bending through the sky, 
Beauteous and terrible, who shines afar, , 

At once the brightest and most baneful star. 

Where Javan from that eastern hill survey'd 
The circling forest and embosom'd glade, 
Earth wore one summer-robe of living green, 
In heaven's blue arch the sun alone was seen ; 
Creation slumber'd in the cloudless light. 
And noon was silent as the depth of night. 
Oh what a throng of rushing thoughts oppress'd. 
In that vast solitude, his anxious breast ! 
— To wither in the blossom of renown, 
And unrecorded to the dust go down, 
Or for a name on earth to quit the prize 
Of immortality beyond the skies, 

Perplex'd his wavering choice : — when Conscience fail'd, 
Love rose against the World, and Love prevail'd ; 
Passion, in aid of Virtue, conquer'd Pride, 
And Woman won the heart to Heaven deniei. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



CANTO SECOND. 

favav, descending through the Forest, arrives at the Place where he had formerly 
parted with Zillah, when he withdrew from the Patriarchs' Olen — There he 
again discovers her in a Bower formed on the Spot— Their strange Interview, 
and abrupt Separation. 

Steep the descent, and wearisome the way, 

The twisted boughs forbade the light of day; 

No breath from heaven refresh'd the sultry gloom, 

The arching forest seem'd one pillar'd tomb, 

Upright and tall the trees of ages grow, 

While all is loneliness and waste below ; 

There, as the massy foliage, far aloof 

Display'd a dark impenetr.ible roof. 

So, gnarl'd and rigid, claspt and interwound, 

An uncouth maze of roots emboss'd the ground : 

Midway beneath, the sylvan wild assumed 

A milder aspect, shrubs and flowerets bloom'd ; 

Openings of sky, and little plots of green. 

And showers of sunbeams through the leaves were seen. 

Awhile the traveller halted at the place 
Where last he caught a glimpse of Zillah's face, 
One lovely eve, when in that calm retreat 
They met, as they were often wont to meet, 
And parted, not as they were wont to part, 
With gay regret, but heaviness of heart ; 
Though Javan named for his return the night, 
When the new moon had roll'd to full-orbed light. 
She stood and gazed through tears, that forced their way, 
Oft as from steep to steep, with fond delay, 
Lessening at every view, he turn'd his head, 
Hail'd her with weaker voice, then forward sped. 
From that sad hour she saw his face no more 
In Eden's woods, or on Euphrates' shore ; 
Moons wax'd and waned ; to her no hope appear'd. 
Who much his death but more his falsehood fear'd. 



J 



IIIE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



Noiv, while he paused, the lapse of years forgot, 
Remembrance eyed her lingering near the spot. 
Onward he hasten'd; all his bosom burn'd, 
As if that eve of parting were return'd ; 
And she, with silent tenderness of wo, 
Clung to his heart, and would not let him go. 
Sweet was the scene ! apart the cedars stood, 
A sunny islet open'd in the wood ; 
With vernal tints the wild-brier thicket glows. 
For here the desert flourish'd as the rose ; 
From sapling trees, with lucid foliage crown'd. 
Gay lights and shadows twinkled on the ground; 
Up the tall stems luxuriant creepers run, 
To hang their silver blossoms in the sun ; 
Deep velvet verdure clad the turf beneath, 
Where trodden flowers their richest odours breathe : 
O'er all the bees, with murmuring music, flew 
From bell to bell, to sip the treasured dew; 
While insect myriads, in the solar gleams. 
Glanced to and fro, like intermingling beams ; 
So fresh, so pure, the woods, the sky, the air, 
It seem'd a place where angels might repair. 
And tune their harps beneath those tranquil shades. 
To morning songs, or moonlight serenades. 

He paused again, with memory's dream entranced, 
Again his foot unconsciously advanced. 
For now the laurel-thicket caught his view, 
Where he and Zillah wept their last adieu. 
Some curious hand, since that bereaving hour, 
Had twined the copse into a covert bower. 
With many a light and fragrant shrub between. 
Flowering aloft amidst perennial green. 
As Javan search'd this blossom-woven shade, 
He spied the semblance of a sleeping maid; 
'Tis she ; 'tis Zillah, in her leafy shrine ; 
O'erwatch'd in slumber by a power divine, 
In cool retirement from the heat of day. 
Alone, unfearing, on the moss she lay. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



Fair as the rainbow shines ihrough darkening showers, 
Pure as a wreath of snow on April flowers. 

O youth ! in later times, whose gentle ear 
This tale of ancient constancy shall hear; 
If thou hast known the sweetness and the pain 
To love with secret hope, yet love in vain : 
If months and years in pining silence worn. 
Till doubt and fear might be no longer borne, 
In evening shades thy faltering tongue confess'd 
The last dear wish that trembled in thy breast. 
While at each pause the streamlet purl'd along, 
And rival woodlands echo'd song for song ; 
Recall the maiden's look ; — the eye, the cheek, 
The blush that spoke what language could not speak ; 
Recall her look, when at the altar's side 
She seal'd her promise, and became thy bride, 
Such were to Javan Zillah's form and face, 
The flower of meekness on a stem of grace ; 
Oh, she was all that youth of beauty deems 
All that to Love the loveliest object seems. 

Moments there are, that, in their Sudden flight, 
Bring the slow mysteries of years to light ; 
Javan, in one transporting instant, knew 
That all he Avish'd, and all he fear'd, was true ; 
For while the harlot-world his soul possess'd. 
Love seem'd a crime in his apostate breast ; 
How could he tempt her innocence to share 
His poor ambition, and his fix'd despair! 
But now the phantoms of a wandering brain. 
And w^ounded spirit, cross'd his thoughts in vain: 
Past sins and follies, cares and woes forgot. 
Peace, virtue, ZiUah, seem'd his present lot ; 
Where'er he look'd, around him or above. 
All was the pledge of Truth, the work of Love, 
At whose transforming hand, where last they stood, 
Had sprung that lone memorial in the wood. 

Thus on the slumbering maid while Javan gazed. 
With quicker swell her hidden bosom raised 



i 



I 




H'tlJtJ/i' hrr hon'M' /iJtviix/ the' con^ccoios ma4^ '.' 

7h« Hbrldf before t/w Flood/. ihnJv 2 



TIIF. WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



The shadowy tresses, that profusely shed 
Their golden wreaths from her reclining head; 
A deeper crimson mantled o'er her cheek, 
Her close lip quiver'd as in act to speak, 
While broken sobs, and tremors of unrest. 
The inward trouble of a dream express'd : 
At length, amidst imperfect murmurs, fell 
The name of " Javan !" and a low " farewell !" 
Tranquil again, her cheek resumed its hue, 
And soft as infancy her breath she drew. 

When Javan's ear those startling accents thrill'd. 
Wonder and ecstasy his bosom fill'd ; 
But quick compunction humbler feelings wrought, 
He blush'd to be a spy on Zillah's thought ; 
He turn'd aside ; within the neighbouring brake. 
Resolved to tarry till the nymph awake, 
There, as in luxury of thought reclined, 
A calm of tenderness composed his mind : 
His stringless harp upon the turf was thrown, 
And on a pipe of most mellifluous tone, 
Framed by himself, the musing Minstrel playM, 
To charm the 'slumberer, cloister'd in the shade. 
Jubal had taught the lyre's responsive string. 
Beneath the rapture of his touch to sing; 
And bade the trumpet wake, with bolder breath, 
The joy of battle in the field of death; 
But Javan first, whom pure affection fired. 
With Love's clear eloquence the flute inspired ; 
At once obedient to the lip and hand. 
It utter'd every feeling at command. 
Light o'er the stops his airy fingers flew, 
A spirit spoke in every tone they drew ; 
'Twas now the skylark on the wings of morn, 
Now the night-warbler leaning on her thorn ; 
Anon through every pulse the music stole. 
And held sublime communion with the soul. 
Wrung from the coyest breast the unprison'd sigh, 
And kindled rapture in the coldest eye. 



TIIF. WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



Thus on his dulcet pipe while Javan play'd, 
Within her bovyer awoke the conscious maid ; 
She, in her dream, by varying fancies crost, 
Had hail'd her wanderer found, and mourn'd him lost: 
In one wild vision, midst a land unknown, 
By a dark river, as she sat alone, 
Javan beyond the stream dejected stood ; 
He spied her soon, and leapt into the flood ; 
The thwarting- current urged him down its course. 
But Love repeird it with victorious force ; 
She ran to help him landing, where at length 
He struggled up the bank with failing strength: 
She caught his hand ; — when, downward from the day, 
A water-monster dragg'd the youth away ; 
She follow'd headlong, but her garments bore 
Her form, light floating, till she saw no more : 
For suddenly the dream's delusion changed. 
And through a blooming wilderness she ranged ; 
Alone she seem'd, but not alone she walk'd, 
Javan, invisible, beside her talk'd. 
He told, how he had journey'd many a year 
With changing seasons in their swift career, 
Danced with the breezes in the bowers of morn, 
Slept in the valley where new moons are born, 
Rode with the planets, on their golden cars. 
Round the blue world inhabited by stars. 
And, bathing in the sun's crystalline streams, 
Became ethereal spirit in the beams, 
Whence were his lineaments, from mortal sight, 
Absorb'd in pure transparency of light ; 
But now, his pilgrimage of glory past. 
In Eden's vale he sought repose at last. 
— The voice was mystery to Zillah's ear. 
Not speech, nor song, yet full, melodious, clear; 
No sounds of winds or waters, birds or bees. 
Were e'er so exquisitely tuned to please. 
Then while she sought him with desiring eyes, 
The airy Javan darted from disguise: 



J 



THK WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



Full on her view a stranger's visage broke ; . 
She fled, she fell, he caught her, — she awoke. 

Awoke from sleep, — but in her solitude 
Found the enchantment of her dream renew'd; 
That living voice, so full, melodious, clear. 
That voice of mystery warbled in her ear. 
Yet words no longer wing the trembling notes, 
Unearthly, inexpressive music floats 
[n liquid tones so voluble and wild, 
Her senses seem by slumber still beguiled : 
Alarm'd, she started from her lonely den. 
But blushing, instantly retired again ; 
The viewless phantom came in sound so near. 
The stranger of her dream might next appear. 
Javan, conceal'd behind the verdant brake, 
Felt his lip fail, and strength his hand forsake ; 
Then dropt his flute, and while he lay at rest 
Heard every pulse that travell'd through his breast. 
Zillah, who deem'd the strange illusion fled. 
Now from the laurel-arbour show'd her head. 
Her eye quick-glancing round, as if, in thought, 
Recoiling from the object that she sought: 
By slow degrees, to Javan in the shade, 
The emerging nymph her perfect shape display'd. 
Time had but touch'd her form to finer grace. 
Years had but shed their favours on her face. 
While secret love, and unrewarded Truth, 
Like cold, clear dew upon the rose of youth, 
Gave to the springing flower a chasten'd bloom, 
And shut from rifling winds its coj^ perfume. 

Words cannot paint the wonder of her look, 
When once again his pipe the minstrel took, 
And soft in under-tones began to play, 
Like the caged woodlark's low-lamenting lay : 
Then loud and shrill, by stronger breath impell'd, 
To higher strains the undaunted music swell'd. 
Till new-born echoes through the forest rang. 
And birds, at noon, in broken slumbers sang. 



32 THE WORLD BEFORK THE FLOOD, 

Bewilderitig transport, infantine surprise, 

Tlirobb'd in her bosom, sparkled in her eyes. 

O'er every feature every feeling shone, 

Her colour changed as Javan changed his tone ; 

While she between the bower and brake entranced 

Alternately retreated or advanced ; 

Sometimes the lessening cadence seem'd to fly. 

Then the full melody came rolling nigh : 

She shrunk, or followed still, with eye and feet, 

Afraid to lose it, more afraid to meet ; 

For yet through Eden's land, by fame alone, 

Jubal's harmonious minstrelsy was known. 

Though nobler songs than cheer'd the Patriarchs' glen 

Never resounded from the lips of men. 

Silence, at length, the listening maiden broke ; 
The heart of Javan check'd him while she spoke : 
Though sweeter than his pipe her accents stole. 
He durst not learn the tumult of her soul. 
But, closely cowering in his ambuscade, 
With sprightlier breath and nimbler finger play'd. 
— "'Tis not the nightingale that sang so well 
When .Tavan left me near this lonely cell : 
'Tis not indeed the nightingale ; — her voice 
Could never since that hour my soul rejoice : 
Some bird from Paradise hath lost her way. 
And carols here a fong-forbidden lay ; 
For ne'er since Eve's transgression mortal ear 
Was privileged such heavenly sounds to hear ; 
Perhaps an angel, while he rests his wings. 
On earth alighting, here his descant sings ; 
Methinks those tones, so full of joy and love, 
Must be the language of the world above ! 
Within this brake he rests." With curious ken. 
As if she fear'd to stir a lion's den. 
Breathless, on tiptoe, round the copse she crept ; 
Her heart beat quicker, louder as she stept. 
Till Javan rose, and fix'd on her his eyes, 
In dumb embarrassment, and feign'd surprise ; 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 13 

Upright she started at the sudden view, 

Back from her brow the scatter'd ringlets flew: 

Paleness a moment overspread her face ; 

But fear to frank astonishment gave place, 

And, with the virgin-blush of innocence, 

She ask'd — "Who art thou, stranger, and from whence?" 

With mild demeanour, and with downcast eye, 
Javan, advancing, humbly made reply; 
— " A wretch escaping from the tribes of men, 
Seeks an asylum in the Patriarchs' glen ; 
As through the forest's breathless gloom I stray'd. 
Up sprang the breeze in this delicious shade ; 
Then, while I sate beneath the rustling tree, 
I waked this pipe to wildest minstrelsy, 
Child of my fancy, framed with Jubal's art. 
To breathe at will the fulness of my heart: 
Fairest of women ! if the clamour rude 
Hath scared the quiet of thy solitude. 
Forgive the innocent offence, and tell 
How far beyond these woods the righteous dwell." — 

Though changed his voice, his look and stature changed. 
In air and garb, in all but love estranged, 
Still in the youthful exile Zillah sought 
A dear lost friend, for ever near her thought ! 
Yet answer'd coldly, — ^jealous and afraid 
Her heart might be mistaken, or betray'd. 
— " Not far from hence the faithful race reside ; 
Pilgrim ! to whom shall I thy footsteps guide ? 
Alike to all, if thou an alien be, 
My father's home invites thee ; follow me." 

She spoke with such a thought-divining look, 
Colour his lip, and power his tongue forsook ; 
At length, in hesitating tone, and low. 
— "Enoch," said he, "the friend of God I know. 
To him I bear a message full of fear; 
I may not rest till he vouchsafe to hear." 

He paused ; his cheek with red confusion burn'd; 
Kindness throucrh her relentins' breast return'd : 



THE WORLD BKFOHE THE FLOOD. 



— "Behold the path," she cried, and led the way: 
Ere long the vale unbosom'd to the day: 
— "Yonder, where two embracing- oaks are seen, 
Arch'd o'er a cottage-roof, that peeps between. 
Dwells Enoch ; stranger ! peace attend thee there, 
My father's sheep demand his daughter's care." 

Javan was so rebuked beneath her eye, 
She vanish'd ere he falter'd a reply, 
And sped, while he in cold amazement stood, 
Along the winding border of the wood ; 
Now lost, now re-appearing, as the glade 
Shone to the sun, or darken'd in the shade, 
He saw, but might not follow, where her flock 
Were wont to rest at noon, beneath a rock. 
He knew the willowy champaign, and the stream. 
Of many an early lay the simple theme, 
Chanted in boyhood's unsuspecting hours. 
When Zillah join'd the song, or praised his powers 
Thither he watch'd her, while her course she bore, 
Nor ceased to gaze when she was seen no more. 



CANTO THIRD. 

Javan's Suliloiimj on ZiUaVs Desertion of him^He reaches the Ruins of his 
Mother's Cotta.ge — Thence he proceeds to Knock's Dwelling— His deception 
there— Enoch and Javan proceed together towards the Place of Sacrifice — De- 
scription of the Patriarchs' Olen — Occasion ef the Family of Seth retiring 
thither at first. 

"Am I so changed by suffering, so forgot, 
That love disowns me, Zillah knows me not? 
Ah ! no : she shrinks from my disastrous fate ; 
She dare not love me, and she cannot hate : 
'Tis just; I merit this : — When Nature's womb 
Ingulf'd my kindred in one common tomb, 
Why was I spared ? — A reprobate by birth, 
To heaven rebellious, unallied on earth, 



THE AVORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



Whither, oh whither sliall the outcast flee ? 
There is no home, no peace, no hope for me. 
I hate the worldling's vanity and noise, 
I have no fellow-feeling in his joys ; 
The saint's serener bliss I cannot share, 
My soul, alas ! hath no communion there. 
This is the portion of my cup below, 
Silent, unriiingled, solitary wo; 
To bear from clime to clime the curse of Cain, 
Sin with remorse, yet find repentance vain ; 
And cling, in blank despair, from breath to breath, 
To nought in life, except the fear of death." — 
I While Javan gave his bitter passion vent, 

I And wander'd on, unheeding where he went, 

' His feet, instinctive, led him to the spot 

I Where rose the ruins of his childhood's cot: 

! Here, as he halted in abrupt surprise, 

j His mother seem'd to vanish from his eyes, 

I As if her gentle form, unmark'd before, 

I Had stood to greet him at the wonted door; 

I Yet did the pale retiring Spirit dart 

A look of tenderness that broke his heart : 

'Twas but a thought, arrested on its flight. 

And bodied forth with visionary light. 

But chill the life-blood ran through every vein. 

The fire of frenzy faded from his brain, 

He cast himself in terror on the ground : 

Slowly recovering strength, he gazed around. 

In wistful silence, eyed those walls decay'd, 

Between whose chinks the lively lizard play'd ; 

The moss-clad timbers, loose and lapsed awry, 

Threatening ere long in wider wreck to lie ; 

The fractured roof, through which the sun-beams shone, 

With rank, unflowering verdure overgrown ; 

The prostrate fragments of the wicker-door. 

And reptile traces on the damp green floor. 

This mournful spectacle while Javan view'd. 

Life's earliest scenes and trials were renew'd ; 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



O'er his dark mind the light of years gone by 
Gleam'd, like the meteors of a northern sky. 
He moved his h'ps, but strove in vain to speak, 
A few slow tears stray'd down his cold, Avan cheek 
Till from his breast a sigh convulsive sprung. 
And " O my mother I" trembled from his tongue. 
That name, though but a murmur, that dear name 
Touch'd every kind affection into flame ; 
Despondency assumed a milder form, 
A ray of comfort darted through the storm ; 
" O God ! be merciful to nje !" — He said. 
Arose, and straight to Enoch's dwelling sped. 

Enoch, who sate, to taste the freshening breeze, 
Beneath the shadow of his cottage-trees. 
Beheld the youth approaching; and his eye. 
Instructed by the light of prophecy, 
Knew from afar, beneath the stranger's air. 
The orphan object of his tenderest care ; 
Forth, with a father's joy, the holy man 
To meet the poor returning pilgrim ran, 
Fell on his neck, and kiss'd him, wept, and cried 
" My son ! my son !" — but Javan shrunk aside ; 
The Patriarch raised, embraced him, oft withdreAv 
His head to gaze, then wept and clasp'd anew. 
The mourner bow'd wath agony of shame. 
Clung round his knees, and call'd upon his name. 
— " Father! behold a supplicant in me, 
A sinner in the sight of heaven and thee ; 
Yet for thy former love, may Javan live ; 
Oh, for the mother's sake, the son forgive ! — 
The meanest office, and the lowest seat. 
In Enoch's house be mine, at Enoch's feet." 

" Come to my home, my bosom, and my rest. 
Not as a stranger and way-faring guest ; 
iMy bread of peace, my cup of blessings share, 
Child of my faith ! and answer to my prayer ! 
Oh, I have wept through many a night for thee. 
And walch'd through many a day this day to see. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 13 

Crown'd is the hope of my desiring heart, 
I am resign'd, and ready to depart : 
With joy I hail my course of nature run, 
Since I have seen thy face, ray son ! my son !" 

So saying, Enoch led to his abode 
The trembling penitent, along the road 
That through the garden's gay enclosure wound ; 
Midst fruits and flowers the Patriarch's spouse they found, 
Plucking the purple clusters from the vine 
To crown the cup of unfermented wine. 
She came to meet them ; — but in strange surmise 
Stopt, and on Javan fix'd her earnest eyes ; 
He kneel'd to greet her hand with wonted grace — 
Ah ! then she knew him ! — as he bow'd his face. 
His mother's features in a glimpse she caught. 
And the son's image rush'd upon her thought ; 
Pale she recoil'd with momentary fright, 
As if a spirit had risen before her sight. 
Returning, with a heart too full to speak, 
She pour'd a flood of tears upon his cheek. 
Then laugh'd for gladness, — but her laugh was wild : 
— " Where hast thou been, my own, my orphan child? 
Child of my soul ! bequeath'd in death to me 
By her who had no other wealth than thee !" 
She cried, and with a mother's love caress'd 
The youth who wept in silence on her breast. 

This hasty tumult of affection o'er, 
They pass'd within the hospitable door ; 
There on a grassy couch, with joy o'ercome, 
Pensive with awe, with veneration dumb, 
Javan reclined, while kneeling at his seat. 
The humble Patriarch wash'd the traveller's feet. 
Quickly the Spouse her plenteous table spread 
With homely viands, milk and fruits and bread. 
Ere long the guest, grown innocently bold. 
With simple eloquence his story told.; 
His sins, his follies, frankly were reveal'd. 
And nothinar but his nameless love conceal'd. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



— "While thus," he cried, "I proved the world a snare, 
Pleasure a serpent, fame a cloud in air; 
While with the sons of men my footsteps trod, 
My home, my heart was Avith the sons of God.' 

"Went not my spirit with thee," Enoch said, 
"When from the mother's grave the orphan fled ? 
Others believed thee slain by beasts of blood, 
Or self-devoted to the strangling flood, 
(Too plainly in thy grief-bewilder'd mien. 
By every eye, a breaking heart was seen ;) 
I mourn'd in secret thine apostasy, 
Nor ceased to intercede with Heaven for thee. 
Strong was my faith, in dreams or waking thought. 
Oft as thine image o'er my mind was brought, 
I deem'd thee living by this conscious sign. 
The deep communion of my soul with thine. 
This day a voice, that thrill'd my breast with fear, 
(Methoughl 'twas Adam's) whisper'd in mine ear, 
— ' Enoch, ere thrice the morning meet the sun, 
Thy joy shall be fulfiU'd, thy rest begun.'— 
While yet those tones were murmuring in air, 
I turn'd to look, — but saw no speaker there : 
Thought I not then of thee, my long-lost joy? 
Leapt not my heart abroad to meet my boy? 
Yes ! and while still I sate beneath the tree, 
Revolving what the signal meant to me, 
I spied thee coming, and with eager feet 
Ran, the returning fugitive to greet: 
Nor less the welcome art thou, since I know 
By this high warning, that from earth I go : 
My days are number'd ; peace on thine attend ! 
The trial comes, — be faithful to the end." 

" Oh live the years of Adam !" cried the youth ; 
"Yet seem thy words to breathe prophetic truth ; 
Sire ! while I roam'd the world, a transient guest, 
From sunrise to the ocean of the west, 
I found that sin, where'er the fool of man 
Nature's primeval wilderness o'er-ran, 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD, 



Had track'd his steps, and ihrough advancing time 

Urged the deluded race from crime to crime, 

Till wrath and strife, in fratricidal war, 

Gather'd the force of nations from afar, 

To deal and suffer death's unheeded blow, 

As if the curse on Adam were too slow, 

Even now an host, like locusts on their way. 

That desolate the earth, and dim the day, 

Led by a giant-king, whose arm hath broke 

Remotest realms to wear his iron yoke. 

Hover o'er Eden, resolute to close 

His final triumph o'er his latest foes ; 

A feeble band, that in their covert lie, 

Like cowering doves beneath the falcon's eye. 

That easy and ignoble conquest won. 

There yet remains one fouler deed undone ; 

Oft have I heard the tyrant in his ire 

Devote this glen to massacre and fire, 

And swear to root, from earth's dishonour'd face. 

The last, least relic of the faithful race ; 

Thenceforth he hopes, on God's terrestrial throne 

To rule the nether universe alone. 

Wherefore, O Sire ! when evening shuts the sky. 

Fly with thy kindred, from destruction fly; 

Far to the south, unpeopled wilds of wood 

Skirt the dark borders of Euphrates' flood; 

There shall the Patriarchs find secure repose, 

Till Eden rest, forsaken of her foes," 

At Javan's speech tlie Matron's cheek grew pale, 
Her courage, not her faith, began to fail; 
Eve's youngest daughter she ; the silent tear 
Witness'd her patience, but betray'd her fear. 
Then answer'd Enoch, with a smile serene. 
That shed celestial beauty o'er his mien ; 
"Here is mine earthly habitation; here 
I w^ait till my Redeemer shall appear ; 
Death and the face of man I dare not shun, 
God is mj' refuge, and His will be done." 



THE WORLD BKFORE THE FLOOD. 



The Matron check'd her uncomplaining sigh, 
And wiped the drop that trembled in her eye. 
Javan with shame and self-abasement blush'd, 
But every care at Enoch's smile was hush'd : 
He feh the power of truth ; his heart o'erflow'd, 
And in his look sublime devotion glow'd. 
Westward the Patriarch turn'd his tranquil face ; 
" The Sun," said he, " hath well-nigh run his race ; 
I to the yearly sacrifice repair, 
Our Brethren meet me at the place of prayer." 

" I follow: O my father! I am thine ; 
Thy God, thy people, and thine altar mine !' 
Exclaim'd the youth, on highest thoughts intent, 
And forth with Enoch through the valley went. 

Deep was that valley, girt with rock and wood. 
In rural groups the scatter'd hamlet stood ; 
Tents, arbours, cottages adorn'd the scene. 
Gardens and fields, and shepherds' walks between ; 
Through all, a streamlet, from its mountain-source. 
Seen but by stealth, pursued its willowy course. 

When first the mingling sons of God and man 
The demon-sacrifice of war began. 
Self-exiled here, the family of Seth 
Renounced a world of violence and death. 
Faithful alone amidst the faithless found,* 
And innocent while murder cursed the ground. 
Here, in retirement from profane mankind. 
They worshipp'd God with purity of mind, 
Fed their small flocks, and till'd their narrow soil. 
Like parent Adam, with submissive toil, 
— Adam, whose eyes their pious hands had closed. 
Whose bones beneath their quiet turf reposed. 
No glen like this, unstain'd with human blood. 
Could youthful nature boast before the flood; 



"So spake the Seraph Abdiel, faithful found 
Among the faithless, faithful only he." 

Paradise Lo 



THE AVORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



Far less shall Earth, now hastening to decay, 

A scene of sweeter loneliness display, 

Where nought was heard but sounds of peace and love, 

Nor seen but woods around, and heaven above. 

Yet not in cold and unconcern'd content 
Their years in that delicious range were spent ; 
Oft from their haunts the fervent Patriarchs broke. 
In strong affection to their kindred spoke, 
With tears and prayers reproved their growing crimes, 
Or told the impending judgments of the times. 
In vain; the world despised the warning word, 
With scorn belied it, or with mockery heard. 
Forbade the zealous monitors to roam. 
And stoned or chased them to their forest home. 
There, from the depth of solitude, their sighs 
Pleaded with Heaven in ceaseless sacrifice, 
And long did righteous Heaven the guilty spare, 
Won by the holy violence of prayer. 

Yet sharper pangs of unavailing wo. 
Those sires in secrecy were doom'd to know; 
Oft by the world's alluring snares misled. 
Their youth from that sequester'd valley fled, 
Join'd the wild herd, increased the godless crew, 
And left the virtuous remnant weak and few. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



CANTO FOURTH. 

Enoch relates to Jaran the Circumstances of the Death of Adam, including his 
Jipfointmcitt of an Manual Sacrifice on the Day of his Transgression and Fall 
in Paradise. 

Thus through the valley while they held their walk, 

Enoch of former days began to talk, 

— "Thou know'st our place of sacrifice and prayer, 

Javan ! for thou wert wont to worship there : 

Built by our father's venerable hands, 

On the same spot our ancient altar stands, 

Where, driven from Eden's hallow'd groves, he found 

A home on earth's unconsecrated ground ; 

Whence, too, his pilgrimage of trial o'er, 

He reach'd the rest which sin can break no more. 

Oft hast thou heard our elder Patriarchs tell 

How Adam once by disobedience fell ; 

Would that my tongue were gifted to display 

The terror and the glory of that day. 

When, seized and stricken by the hand of Death, 

The first transgressor yielded up his breath ! 

Nigh threescore years, with interchanging light. 

The host of heaven have measured day and night, 

Since we beheld the ground, from which he rose. 

On his returning dust in silence close. 

"With him his noblest sons might not compare, 
In godlike feature and majestic air; 
Not out of weakness rose his gradual frame. 
Perfect from his Creator's hand he came ; 
And as in form excelling, so in mind 
The Sire of men transcended all mankind ; 
A soul was in his eye, and in his speech 
A dialect of heaven no art could reach ; 
For oft of old to him the evening breeze 
Had borne the voice of God among the trees ; 
Angels were wont their songs with his to blend, 
And talk with him as their familiar friend. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



But deep remorse, for that m5-sterious crime 
Whose dire contagion through elapsing time 
Diffused the curse of death beyond control, 
Had wrought such self-abasement in his soul, 
That he, whose honours were approach'd by none. 
Was yet the meekest man beneath the sun. 
From sin, as from the serpent that betray'd 
Eve's early innocence, he shrunk afraid; 
Vice he rebuked with so austere a frown. 
He seem'd to bring an instant judgment down ; 
Yet while he chid, compunctious tears would start. 
And yearning tenderness dissolve his heart ! 
The guilt of all his race became his own. 
He suffer'd as if /te had sinn'd alone. 
Within our glen, to filial love endear'd. 
Abroad for wisdom, truth, and justice fear'd. 
He walk'd so humbly in the sight of all, 
The vilest ne'er reproach'd him with his fall. 
Children were his delight ; — they ran to meet 
His soothing hand, and clasp his honour'd feet; 
While midst their fearless sports, supremely blest. 
He grew in heart a child among the rest : 
Yet as a Parent, nought beneath the sky 
Touch'd him so quickly as an infant's eye : 
Joy from its smile of happiness he caught ; 
Its flash of rage sent horror through his thought: 
His smitten conscience felt as fierce a pain 
As if he fell from innocence again. 

" One morn I track'd him on his lonely way, 
Pale as the gleam of slow-awakening day; 
With feeble step he climb'd yon craggy height, 
Thence fix'd on distant Paradise his sight; 
He gazed awhile in silent thought profound. 
Then falling prostrate on the dewy ground. 
He pour'd his spirit in a flood of prayer, 
Bewail'd his ancient crime with self-despair. 
And claim'd the pledge of reconciling grace. 
The promised Seed, the Saviour of his race. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



Wrestling with God, as nature's vigour fail'd, 
His faith grew stronger and his plea prevail'd ; 
The prayer from agony to rapture rose, 
And sweet as angel accents fell the close. 
I stood to greet him: when he raised his head, 
Divine expression o'er his visage spread ; 
His presence was so saintly to behold. 
He seem'd in sinless Paradise grown old. 

" — 'This day,' said he, ' in Time's star-lighted round, 
Renews the anguish of that mortal wound 
On me inflicted, when the Serpent's tongue 
My Spouse with his beguiling falsehood stung. 
Though years of grace through centuries have pass'd 
Since my transgression, this may be my last; 
Infirmities without, and fears within, 
Foretell the consummating stroke of sin; 
The hour, the place, 'the form to me unknown, 
But God, who lent me life, will claim his own ; 
Then, lest I sink as suddenly in death 
As quicken'd into being by his breath, 
Once more I climb'd these rocks with weary pace, 
And but once more, to view my native place. 
To bid yon garden of delight farewell, - 
The earthly Paradise from which I fell. 
This mantle, Enoch ! which I yearly wear 
To mark the day of penitence and prayer, — 
These skins, the covering of my first offence. 
When, conscious of departed innocence. 
Naked and trembling from my Judge I fled, 
A hand of mercy o'er my vileness spread ; — 
Enoch ! this mantle thus vouchsafed to me, 
At my dismission I bequeath to thee ; 
Wear it in sad memorial on this day, 
And yearly at mine earliest altar slay 
A Iamb immaculate, whose blood be spilt 
In sign of wrath removed and cancell'd guilt: 
So be the sins of all my race confest. 
So on their heads may peace and pardon rest.' 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



— Thus spake our Sire, and down the steep descent, 
With strengthen'd heart, and fearless footstep went: 

Javan ! when we parted at his door, 

1 loved him as I never loved before. 

"Ere noon, returning to his bower, I found 
Our father labouring in his harvest ground, 
(For yet he till'd a little plot of soil, 
Patient and pleased with voluntary toil) ; 
But oh how changed from him whose morning eye 
Outshone the star that told the sun was nigh ! 
Loose in his feeble grasp the sickle shook ; 
I mark'd the ghastly dolour of his look. 
And ran to help him ; but his latest strength 
Fail'd; — prone upon his sheaves he fell at length: 
I strove to raise him; sight and sense were fled, 
Nerveless his limbs, and backward sway'd his head. 
Seth pass'd ; I call'd him, and we bore our Sire 
To neighbouring shades from noon's afflictive fire : 
Ere long he woke to feeling, with a sigh. 
And half unclosed his hesitating eye ; 
Strangely and timidly he peer'd around. 
Like men in dreams whom sudden lights confound : 
— ' Is this a new Creation ? — Have I pass'd 
The bitterness of death ?' — He look'd aghast, 
Then sorrowful ! — ' No ; men and trees appear ; 
'Tis not a new Creation — pain is here : 
From Sin's dominion is there no release ? 
Lord.; let thy Servant now depart in peace.' 
— Hurried remembrance crowding o'er his soir. 
He knew us ; tears of consternation stole 
Down his pale cheeks: — 'Seth! — Enoch! — ^Wherc isE\'e1 
How could the spouse her dying consort leave V 

"Eve look'd that moment from their cottage-door 
In quest of Adam, where he toil'd before ; 
He was not there ; she call'd him by his name ; 
Sweet to his ear the well-known accents came ; 
— 'Here am I,' answer'd he, in tone so weak. 
That we who held him scarcely heard him speak 



But, resolutely bent to rise, in vain 

He struggled till he swoon'd away with pain. 

Eve call'd again, and, turning towards the shade, 

Helpless as infancy, beheld him laid; 

She sprang, as smitten with a mortal wound, 

Forward, and cast herself upon the ground 

At Adam's feet; half rising in despair, 

Him from our arms she wildly strove to tear; 

Repell'd by gentle violence, she press'd 

His powerless hand lo her convulsive breast. 

And kneeling, bending o'er him, full of fears. 

Warm on his bosom shower'd her silent tears. 

Light to his eyes at that refreshment came, 

They open'd on her in a transient flame ; 

—'And art thou here, my Life ! my Love !' he cried, 

'Faithful in death to this congenial side ? 

Thus let me bind thee to my breaking heart, 

One dear, one bitter moment, ere we part.' 

— 'Leave me not, Adam! leave me not below; 

With thee I tarrjs or with thee I go,' 

She said, and yielding to his faint embrace, 

Clung round his neck, and wept upon his face. 

Alarming recollection soon return'd. 

His fever'd frame with growing anguish burn'd : 

Ah! then, as Nature's tenderest impulse wrought, 

With fond solicitude of love she sought 

To soothe his limbs upon their grassy bed. 

And make the pillow easy to his head, 

She wiped his reeking temples with her hair; 

She shook the leaves to stir the sleeping air ; 

Moisten'd his lips with kisses: with her breath 

Vainly essay'd to quell the fire of Death, 

That ran and revell'd through his swollen veins 

With quicker pulses, and severer pains. 

"The sun, in summer majesty on high. 
Darted his fierce effulgence down the sky; 
Yet dimm'd and blunted were the dazzling rays, 
His orb expanded through a dreary haze, 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



And, circled with a red, portentous zone. 

He look'd in sickly horror from his throne : 

The vital air was still ; the torrid heat 

Oppressed our hearts, that labour'd hard to beat. 

When hig-he'r noon had shrunk the lessening shade, 

Thence to his home our father we convey'd, 

And stretch'd him, pillow'd with his latest sheaves, 

On a fresh couch of green and fragrant leaves. 

Here, though his sufferings through the glen were known, 

We chose to watch bis dying bed alone. 

Eve, Seth, and I. In vain he sigh'd for rest, 

And oft his meek complainings thus express'd : 

— 'Blow on me. Wind ! I faint with heat ! oh bring 

Delicious water from the deepest spring ; 

Your sunless shadows o'er my limbs diffuse. 

Ye Cedars ! wash me cold with midnight dews. 

— Cheer me, my friends ! with looks of kindness cheer : 

Whisper a word of comfort in mine ear ; 

Those sorrowing faces fill my soul with gloom; 

This silence is the silence of the tomb. 

Thither I hasten ; help me on my way ; 

O sing to soothe me, and to strengthen pray !' 

We sang to soothe him, — hopeless was the song; 

We pray'd to strengthen him, — he grew not strong. 

In vain from every herb, and fruit, and flower, 

Of cordial sweetness, or of healing power, 

We press'd the virtue ; no terrestrial balm 

Nature's dissolving agony could calm. 

Thus, as the day declined, the fell disease 

Eclipsed the light of life by slow degrees : 

Yet while his pangs grew sharper, more resign'd. 

More self-collected grew the sufferer's mind; 

Patient of heart, though rack'd at every pore, 

The righteous penalty of sin he bore ; 

Not his the fortitude that mocks at pains, 

But that which feels them most, and yet sustains. 

— ' 'Tis just, 'tis merciful,' we heard him say; 

'Yet wherefore hath he turn'd his face away? 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



I see Him not ; I hear Him not ; I call ; 
My God ! my God ! support me, or I fall.' 

"The sun went down amidst an ang-ry glare 
Of flushing clouds, that crimson'd all the air ; • 
The winds brake loose ; the forest boughs were torn, 
And dark aloof the eddying foliage borne ; 
Cattle to shelter scudded in affright; 
The florid evening vanish'd into night: 
Then burst the hurricane upon the vale, 
In peals of thunder, and thick-voUied hail; 
Prone rushing rains with torrents whelm'd the land, 
Our cot amidst a river seem'd to stand ; 
Around its base, the foamy-crested streams 
Flash'd through the darkness to the lightning's gleams, 
With monstrous throes an earthquake heaved the ground. 
The rocks were rent, the mountains trembled round ; 
Never since Nature into being came. 
Had such mysterious motion shook her frame ; 
We thought, ingulf'd in floods, or wrapt in fire, 
The world itself would perish with our Sire. 

" Amidst this war of elements, within 
More dreadful grew the sacrifice of sin. 
Whose victim on his bed of torture lay. 
Breathing the slow remains of life away. 
Erewhile, victorious faith sublimer rose 
Beneath the pressure of collected woes : 
But now his spirit waver'd, went and came, 
Like the loose vapour of departing flame, 
Till at the point, when comfort seem'd to die 
For ever in his fix'd, unclosing eye, 
Bright through the smouldering ashes of the man 
The saint brake forth, and Adam thus began : 

" — 'O ye, that shudder at this awful strife, 
This wrestling agony of Death and Life, 
Think not that He, on whom my soul is cast. 
Will leave me thus forsaken to the last; 
Nature's infirmity alone you see ; 
My chains are breaking, I shall soon be free ; 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 

Though firm in God the Spirit holds her trust, 
The flesh is frail, and trembles into dust. 
Horror and anguish seize me ; — 'tis the hour 
Of darkness, and I mourn beneath its power; 
The Tempter plies me with his direst art, 
I feel the Serpent coiling round my heart ; 
He stirs the wound he once inflicted there. 
Instils the deadening poison of despair, 
Belies the truth of God's delaying grace. 
And bids me curse my Maker to his face. 
— I will not curse Him, though his grace delay: 
I will not cease to trust Him, though He slay; 
Full on his promised mercy I rely, 
For God hath spoken, — God, who cannot lie. 
— Thou, of my faith the Author and the End ! 
Mine early, late, and everlasting Friend ! 
The joy, that once thy presence gave, restore 
Ere I am summon'd hence, and seen no more : 
Down to the dust returns this earthly frame. 
Receive my Spirit, Lord ! from whom it came ; 
Rebuke the Tempter, show thy power to save, 
O let thy glory light me to the grave. 
That these, who witness my departing breath, 
May learn to triumph in the grasp of Death.' 

" He closed his eyelids with a tranquil smile, 
And seem'd to rest in silent prayer awhile : 
Around his couch with filial awe we kneel'd. 
When suddenly a light from heaven reveal'd 
A Spirit, that stood within the unopen'd door; — 
The sword of God in his right hand he bore ; 
His countenance was lightning, and his vest 
Like snow at sunrise on the mountain's crest; 
Yet so benignly beautiful his form. 
His presence still'd the fury of the storm; 
At once the winds retire, the waters cease ; 
His look was love, his salutation 'Peace !' 

" Our mother first beheld him, sore amazed, 
But terror grew to transport while she gazed : 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



— ''Tis He, the Prince of Seraphim, who drove 

Our banish'd feet from Eden's happy grove ;* 

Adam, my Life, my Spouse, awake !' she cried ; 

'Return to Paradise ; behold thy Guide ! 

O let me follow in this dear embrace !' 

She sunk, and on his bosom hid her Aice. 

Adam look'd up ; his visage changed its hue, 

Transform'd into an angel's at the view: 

'I come !' he cried, with faith's full triumph fired. 

And in a sigh of ecstasy expired. 

The light was vanish'd, and the vision fled; 

We stood alone, the living with the dead ; 

The ruddy embers, glimmering round the room, 

Display'd the corpse amidst the solemn gloom ; 

But o'er the scene a holy calm reposed. 

The gate of heaven had open'd there, and closed. 

"Eve's faithful arm still clasp'd her lifeless Spouse ; 
Gently I shook it from her trance to rouse ; 
She gave no answer; motionless and cold, . 
It fell like clay from my relaxing hold ; 
Alarm'd, I lifted up the locks of gray 
That hid her cheek; her soul had pass'd away: 
A beauteous corse she graced her partner's side. 
Love bound their hves, and Death could not divide. 

"Trembling astonishment of grief we felt, 
Till Nature's sympathies began to melt ; 
We wept in stillness through the long, dark night; 
— And oh how welcome was the morning light !" 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



CANTO FIFTH. 

The Burying-plaee of the Patriarchs — The Sacrifice on the Anniversary of the 
Fall of Adam— Enoch' s Prophecy. 

"And here," said Enoch, with dejected eye, 
" Behold the grave in which our Parents lie." 
They stopp'd, and o'er the turf-enclosure wept, 
Where, side by side, the First-Created slept: 
It seem'd as if a voice, with still small sound. 
Heard in their bosoms, issued from that mound : 

" From earth we came, and we return'd to earth : 

Descendants ! spare the Dust that gave you birth; 

Though Death, the pain for our transgression due, 

By sad inheritance we left to you, 

Oh let our Children bless us in our grave, 

And man forgive the wrong that God forgave !" 

Thence to the altar Enoch turn'd his face ; 
But Javan linger'd in that burying-place, 
A scene sequester'd from the haunts of men. 
The loveliest nook of all that lovely glen, 
Where weary pilgrims found their last repose : 
The little heaps were ranged in comely rows, 
With walks between, by friends and kindred trod, 
Who dress'd with duteous hands each hallow'd sod: 
No sculptured monument was taught to breathe 
Flis praises, whom the worm devour'd beneath ; 
The high, the low, the mighty, and the fair, 
Equal in death, were undistinguish'd there ; 
Yet not a hillock moulder'd near that spot. 
By one dishonour'd or by all forgot ; 
To some warm heart, the poorest dust was dear. 
From some kind eye, the meanest claim'd a tear. 
And oft the living, by affection led. 
Were wont to walk in spirit with their dead. 
Where no dark cypress cast a doleful gloom. 
No blighting yew shed poison o'er the tomb, 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



But, white and red with intermingling flowers, 
The graves look'd beautiful in sun and showers. 
Green m3Ttles fenced it, and beyond their bound 
Ran the clear rill with ever-murmuring sound ; 
'Twas not a scene for Grief to nourish care, 
It breathed of Hope, and moved the heart to prayer. 

Why linger'd Javan in that lone retreat ? 
The shrine of her that bare him drew his feet; 
Trembling he sought it, fearing to behold 
A bed of thistles, or unsightly mould ; 
But, lo ! the turf, which his own hands had piled, 
With choicest flowers, and richest verdure smiled : 
B\' all the glen, his mother's couch of rest, 
In his default, was visited and blest. 
He kneel'd, he kiss'd it, full of love and woe ; 
His heart was where his treasure lay, below ; 
And long he tarried, ere, with heav'nward eyes, 
He rose, and hasten'd to the sacrifice. 

Already on a neighbouring mo'unt, that stood 
Apart amidst the valley, girt with wood. 
Whose open summit rising o'er the trees. 
Caught the cool fragrance of the evening breeze, 
The Patriarchal Worshippers were met ; 
The Lamb was brought, the wood in order set 
On Adam's rustic altar, moss-o'ergrown, 
An unwrought mass of earth-embedded stone. 
Long known and hallow'd, where, for man's offence. 
The earth first drank the blood of innocence. 
When God himself ordain'd the typic rite 
To Eden's Exiles, resting on their flight. 
Foremost, amidst the group, was Enoch seen, 
Known by his humble port, and heavenly mien : 
On him the Priest's m3^sterious office lay, 
For 'twas the eve of Man's transgression-day. 
And him had Adam, with expiring breath, 
Ordain'd to ofTer yearly, from his death, 
A victim on that mountain, whence the skies 
Had first inhaled the fumes of sacrifice. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



In Adam's coat of skins array'd he stands, 
Spreading to heaven his supplicating hands, 
Ere from his robe the deadly steel he drew 
To smite the victim, sporting in his view. 
Behind him Seth, in majesty confess'd. 
The World's great Elder, tower'd above the rest. 
Serenely shone his sweet and solemn eye. 
Like the sun reigning in the western sky ; 
Though nine slow centuries by stealth had shed 
Gray hairs, the crown of glory, on his head, 
In hardy health, he rear'd his front sublime, 
Like the green aloe, in perennial prime, 
When full of years it shoots forth all its bloom. 
And glads the forest through the inmost gloom; 
So, in the blossom of a good old age, 
Flourish'd amidst his sons that peerless sage. 
I Around him, in august succession, stood 

The fathers of the world before the Flood : 
— Enos ; who taught mtinkind, on solemn days, 
In sacred groves, to meet for prayer and praise, 
And warn'd idolaters to lift their eye. 
From sun and stars, to him who made the sky ; 
— Canaan and Malahel ; of whom alone 
Their age, of all that once they were, is known : 
— Jared ; vi'ho, full of hope beyond the tomb, 
Hallow'd his offspring from the Mother's womb. 
And heaven received the Son ihat Parent gave. 
He walk'd with God, and overstepp'd the grave ; 
— A mighty pilgrim in the vale of tears. 
Born to the troubles of a thousand years, 
Methuselah, whose feet unhalting ran 
To the last circle of the life of man : 
— Lamech ; from infancy inured to toil, 
To wring slow blessing-s from the accursed soil. 
Ere yet to dress his vineyards, reap his corn, 
And comfort him in care, was Noah born. 
Who, in a later age, by signal grace. 
Survived to renovate the human race ; 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



Both worlds, by sad reversion, were his due. 
The Orphan of the old, the Father of the new. 
These, with their families, on either hand. 
Aliens and exiles in their native land. 
The few who loved their Maker from their youth. 
And worshipp'd God in spirit and in truth : 
These stood with Enoch : — all had fix'd their eyes 
On him, and on the Lamb of sacrifice. 
For now with trembling hand he shed the blood, 
And placed the slaughter'd victim on the wood; 
Then kneeling, as the sun went down, he laid 
His hand upon the hallow'd pyre and pray'd : — 
"Maker of heaven and earth! supreme o'er all 
That live, and move, and breathe, on Thee we call: 
Our father sinn'd and suffer'd ; — we, who bear 
Our father's image, his transgression share ; 
Humbled for his offences, and our own. 
Thou, who art holy, wise, and just alone, 
Accept, with free confession of our guilt. 
This victim slain, this blood devoutly spilt. 
While through the veil of sacrifice Ave see 
Thy mercy smiling, and look up to Thee ; 
Oh grant forgiveness ; power and grace are thine ; 
God of salvation ! cause thy face to shine ; 
Hear us in heaven ! fulfil our souls' desire, 
God of our father! answer now Avith fire." 

He rose ; no light from heaven around him shone. 
No fire descended from the eternal throne : 
Cold on the pile the offer'd victim lay. 
Amidst the stillness of expiring day; 
The eyes of all that Avatch'd in vain to view 
The wonted sign, distractedly withdrew; 
Fear clipp'd their breath, their doubling pulses raised, 
And each by stealth upon his neighbour gazed ; 
From heart to heart a strange contagion ran, 
A shuddering instinct crowded man to man ; 
Even Seth with secret consternation shook, 
And cast on Enoch an imploring look. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



Enoch, in whose subhme, unearthly mien, 

No change of hue, no cloud of care was seen, 

Full on the mute assembly turn'd his face, 

Clear as the sun prepared to run his race : 

He spoke ; his words, with awful warning fraught. 

Rallied and fix'd the scalter'd powers of thought. 

" Men, brethren, fathers ! wherefore do you fear? 
Hath God departed from us? — God is here ; 
Present in every heart, with sovereign power. 
He tries, he proves his people in this hour; 
Naked as light to his all-searching eye. 
The thoughts that wrong, the doubts that tempt Him lie 
Yet slow to anger, merciful as just. 
He knows our frame, remembers we are dust. 
And spares our weakness : — in his truth believe, 
Hope against hope, and ask till ye receive. 
What though no flame on Adam's altar burn, 
No signal of acceptance yet return, 
God is not man, who to our father swore. 
All times, in every place, to answer prayer ; 
He cannot change ; though heaven and earth decay, 
The word of God shall never pass away. 

" But mark the season : — from the rising sun. 
Westward the race of Cain the world o'er-run ; 
Their monarch, mightiest of the sons of men, 
Hath sworn destruction to the Patriarchs' glen ; 
Hither he hastens; carnage strews his path; 
— Who Aviil await the giant in his wrath ? 
Or who will take the wings of silent night. 
And seek deliverance from his sword by flight? 
Thus saith the Lord : — Ye weak of faith and heart ! 
Who dare not trust the living God, depart; 
The angel of his presence leads your way, 
Your lives are safe, and given you as a prey : 
But ye, who, unappall'd at earthly harm. 
Lean on the strength of his Almighty arm ; 
Prepared for life or death, with firm accord, 
— Stand still, and see the glory of the Lord." 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



A pause, a dreary pause ensued : — then cried 
The holy man, — " On either hand divide ; 
The feeble fly ; with me the valiant stay ; 
Choose now your portion ; whom will ye obey, 
God or your fears ? His counsel or your own ?" 
— " The Lord ; the Lord ; for He is God alone !" 
Exclaim'd at once, with consentaneous choice, 
The whole assembly, heart, and sonl, and voice. 
Then^liirht from heaven with sudden beauty came, 
Pure on the altar blazed the unkind led flame. 
And upwards to their glorious source return'd 
The sacred fires in which the victim burn'd : 
While through the evening gloom, to distant eyes 
Morn o'er the Patriarchs' mountains seem'd to rise. 

Awe-struck the congregation kneel'd around. 
And worshipp'd Avith their faces to the ground ; 
The peace of God, beyond expression sweet, 
Fill'd every spirit humbled at his feet. 
And love, joy, wonder, deeply mingling there. 
Drew from the heart unutterable prayer. 

They rose ; — as if his soul had pass'd away, 
Prostrate before the altar Enoch lay. 
Entranced so deeply all believed him dead : 
At length he breathed, he moved, he raised his head: 
To heaven in ecstasy he turn'd his eyes ; 
— With such a look the dead in Christ shall rise. 
When the last trumpet calls them from the dust. 
To join the resurrection of the just : — 
Yea, and from earthly grossness so refined, 
(As if the soul had left the flesh behind, 
Yet wore a mortal semblance,) upright stood 
The great Evangelist before the Flood ; 
On him the vision of the Almighty broke. 
And future times were present while he spoke.* 
"The Saints shall sufll?r; righteousness shall fail; 
O'er all the world iniquity prevail; 

* Numbers xxiv. 4. 



Giants, in fierce contempt of man and God, 

Shall rule the nations with an iron rod ; 

On every mountain idol groves shall rise, 

And darken heaven with human sacrifice ; 

But God, the Avenger, comes, — a judgment-day, 

A flood, shall sweep his enemies away. 

How few, whose eyes shall then have seen the sun, 

— One righteous family, and only one, — 

Saved from that wreck of Nature, shall behold 

The new Creation rising from the old ! 

"Oh that the world of wickedness, destroy'd, 
Might live for ever without form and void ! 
Or that the earth, to innocence restored. 
Might flourish as the garden of the Lord I 
It will not be : — among the sons of men. 
The Giant-Spirit will go forth again, 
From clime to clime shall kindle murderous rage, 
And spread the plague of sin .from age to age ; 
Yet shall the God of mercy, from above, 
Extend the golden sceptre of his love. 
And win the rebels to his righteous sway, 
Till every mouth confess, and heart obey. 

"Amidst the visions of ascending years. 
What mighty Chief,' what Conqueror appears ;* 
His garments roll'd in blood, his eyes of flame, 
And on his thigh the unutterable name ?t 
— ' 'Tis I that bring deliverance : strong to save, 
I pluck'd the prey from death, and spoil'd the grave. 
— Wherefore, O Warrior ! are thy garments red, 
Like those whose feet amidst the vintage tread ? 
— ' I trod the w^ine-press of the field alone ; 
I look'd around for succour; there was none ; 
Therefore my wrath sustain'd me while I fought. 
And mine own arm my Saints' salvation wrought.' 
— Thus may thine arm for evermore prevail ; 
Thus may thy foes, O Lord ! for ever fail ; 

* Isa. Ixiii. 1—6. t Rev. xix. 12. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



Captive by thee captivity be led ; 
Seed of the woman ! bruise the serpent's head ; 
Redeemer! promised since the world began, 
Bow the high heavens, and condescend to man. 

"Hail to the Day-spring; dawning from afar, 
Bright in the east I see his natal star: 
Prisoners of hope ! lift up your joyful eyes ; 
Welcome the King of Glory from the skies : 
Who is the King of Glory? — Mark his birth : 
In deep humility he stoops to earth. 
Assumes a servant's form, a Pilgrim's lot, 
Comes to his own, his own receive him not, 
Though angel-choirs his peaceful advent greet. 
And Gentile sages worship at his feet. 

"Fair as that sovereign Plant, whose scions shoot 
With healing verdure, and immortal fruit. 
The Tree of Life, beside the stream that laves 
The fields of Paradise wit-li gladdening waves ; 
Behold him rise from infancy to youth. 
The Father's image, full of grace and truth ; 
Tried, tempted, proved in secret, till the hour. 
When, girt with meekness, but array'd with power 
Forth in the spirit of the Lord at length. 
Like the sun shining in meridian strength, 
He goes : — to preach good tidings to the poor; 
To heal the wounds that nature cannot cure ; 
To bind the broken-hearted ; to control 
Disease and death ; to raise the sinking soul : 
Unbar the dungeon, set the captive free, 
Proclaim the joyous year of liberty. 
And, from the depth of undiscover'd night, 
Bring life and immortality to light. 

" How beauteous on the mountains are thy feet, 
Thy form how comely, and thy voice how sweet, 
Son of the Highest ! — Who can tell thy fame ? 
The Deaf shall hear it while the Dumb proclaim ! 
Now bid the Blind behold their Saviour's light. 
The Lame go forth rejoicing in their might ; 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



Cleanse with a touch yon kneeling Leper's skin ; 
Cheer this pale Penitent, forgive her sin ; 
Oh, for that Mother's faith, her Daughter spare ; 
Restore the Maniac to a Father's prayer; 
Pity the tears those mournful Sisters shed, 
And Be the Resurrection of the Dead ! 

" What scene is this ? — Amidst involving gloom 
The moonlight lingers on a lonely tomb ; 
No noise disturbs the garden's hallow'd bound. 
But the watch walking on their midnight round : 
Ah! who lies here, with marr'd and bloodless mien, 
In whom no form or comeliness is seen ; 
His livid limbs with nails and scourges torn, 
His side transpierced, his temples wreathed with thorn ? 
'Tis Pie, the Man of Sorrows ! He who bore 
Our sins and chastisement: — His toils are o'er; 
On earth erewhile a suffering life he led. 
Here hath he found a place to lay his head ; 
Rank'd with transgressors he resign'd his breath. 
But with the rich he made his bed in death. 
Sweet is the grave where Angels watch and weep ; 
Sweet is the grave, and sanctified his sleep ; 
Rest, O my spirit ! by this martyr'd form, 
This wreck, that sunk beneath the Almighty storm. 
When floods of wrath that weigh'd the world to hell. 
On him alone in righteous vengeance fell ; 
While men derided, demons urged his woes. 
And God forsook him, — till the awful close ; 
Then, in triumphant agony, he cried, 
— ' 'Tis finish'd !' — bow'd his sacred head, and died. 
Death, as he struck that noblest victim, found 
His sting was lost for ever in the wound ; 
The Grave, that holds his corse, her richest prize, 
Shall yield him back, victorious, to the skies. 
He lives : ye bars of steel ! ye gates of brass ! 
Give way and let the King of Glory pass ; — 
He lives : ye golden portals of the spheres ! 
Open, the Sun of Righteousness appears. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



But, ah ! my spirit faints beneath the blaze, 
That breaks, and briglitens o'er the hotter days, 
When every tongue his trophies shall proclaim, 
And every knee shall worship at his name ; 
For he shall reign Avith undivided power, 
To Earth's last bounds, to Nature's final hour. 

" 'Tis done : — again the conquering Chief appears 
In the dread vision of dissolving years ; 
His vesture dipp'd in blood, his eyes of flame. 
The Word of God his everlasting name ;^' 
Throned in mid-heaven, with clouds of glory spread. 
He sits in judgment on the quick and dead ; 
Strong to deliver ; Saints ! your songs prepare ; 
Rush from your tombs to meet him in the air : 
But terrible in vengeance ; Sinners ! bowt 
Your haughty heads, the grave protects not now : 
He who alone in mortal conflict trod 
The mighty wine-press of the wrath of God, 
Shall fill the cup of trembling to his foes, 
The unmingled cup of inexhausted woes ; 
The proud shall drink it in that dreadful day. 
While earth dissolves, and heaven is roU'd away." 

Here ceased the Prophet : — from the altar broke 
The last dim wreaths of fire-illumined smoke ; 
Darkness had fallen around ; but o'er the streams 
The Moon, new-ris'n, diffused her brightening beams; 
Homeward, with tears, the worshippers return'd, 
Yet while they wept their hearts within them buni'd. 





CANTO SIXTH. 

Javan's second Interview with Zillah—He visits the various Dwellings scattered 
throughout the Olen, and in the Evening sings to his Harp, amidst.the assembled 
Inhabitants :— Address to Twilight ; Jubal's Song of the Creation — the Power 
of Music exemplified. 

Spent with the toils of that eventful day, 
All night in dreamless slumber Javan lay ; 
But early springing from his bed of leaves, 
Waked by the songs of swallows on the eaves, 
From Enoch's cottage, in the cool, gray hour. 
He wander'd forth to Zillah's woodland bower; 
There, in his former covert, on the ground. 
The frame of his forsaken harp he found : 
He smote the boss; the convex orb unstrung. 
Instant Avith sweet reverberation rung ; 
The minstrel smiled, at that sonorous stroke. 
To find the spell of harmony unbroke ; 
Trickling with dew, he bore it to the cell ; 
There, as with leaves he dried the sculptured shell. 
He thought of Zillah, and resolved too late 
To plead his constancy, and know his fate. 

She from the hour, when, in a pilgrim's guise, 
Javan relurn'd, — a stranger to her eyes. 
Not to her heart, — from anguish knew no rest. 
Love, pride, resentment, struggling in her breast. 
All day she strove to hide her misery, 
In vain : — a mother's eye is quick to see, 
Slow to rebuke a daughter's bashful fears, 
And Zillah's mother only chid with tears : 
Night came, but Javan came not with the night ; 
Light vanish'd, Hope departed \Vith the light; 
Her lonely couch conceal'd her sleepless woes. 
But with the morning star the maiden rose. 
The soft refreshing breeze, the orient beams, 
The dew, the mist unrollinof from the streams, 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



The lig-ht, the joy, the music of the hour, 

Stole on her spirit with resistless poAver, 

With healing sweetness soothed her fever'd brain, 

And woke the pulse of tenderness again. 

Thus while she wander'd, with unconscious feet, 

Absent in thought she reach'd her sylvan seat : 

The youth descried her not amidst the wood, 

Till, like a vision, at his side she stood. 

Their eyes encounter'd; both at once exclaim'd, 

"Javan !" and "Zillah!" — each the other named; 

Those sounds were life or death to either heart ; 

He rose ; she turn'd in terror to depart ; 

He caught her hand : — " Oh do not, do not flee !" 

—It was a moment of eternity, 

And now or never must he plight his vow. 

Win or abandon her for ever now. 

" Stay : — hear me, Zillah ! — every power above, 
Heaven, earth, thyself, bear witness to my love ! 
Thee have I loved from earliest infancy. 
Loved with supreme affection only thee. 
Long in these shades my timid passion grew. 
Through every change, in every trial true ; 
I loved thee through the world in dumb despair. 
Loved thee, that I might love no other fair; 
Guilty, yet faithful still, to thee I fly. 
Receive me, love me, Zillah ! or I die." 
I Thus Javan's lips, so long in silence seal'd, 

j With sudden vehemence his soul reveal'd ; 

j Zillah meanwhile recover'd power to speak, 

While deadly paleness overcast her cheek : 
! — "Say not, 'I love thee !' — Witness every tree 

I Around this bovver, thy cruel scorn of me !• 

I Could Javan love me through the world, yet leave 

Her whom he loved, for hopeless years, to grieve ? 
Returning, could he find her here alone, 
I Yet pass her by, unknowing, as unknown ? 

I All day was she forsaken, or forgot ? 

Did Javan seek her at her father's cot ? 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



That cot of old so much his soul's delight, 
His mother's seem'd not fairer in his sight : 
No : Javan mocks me ; none could love' so well, 
So long, so painfully, — and never tell." 

" Love owns no law," rejoin'd the pleading youth, 
"Except obedience to eternal truth: 
Deep streams are silent; from the generous breast, 
The dearest feelings are the last confest: 
Erewhile I strove in vain to break my peace, 
Now I could talk of love and never cease : 
— Still had my trembling passion been conceal'd ; 
Still but in parables by stealth reveal'd. 
Had not thine instantaneous presence wrung. 
By swift surprise, the secret from my tongue. 
Yet hath Affection language of her own. 
And mine in every thing but words was shown ; 
In childhood, as the bird of nature free, 
My song was gladness, when I sung to thee : 
In youth, whene'er I mourn'd a bosom flame. 
And praised a maiden whom I durst not name, 
Couldst thou not then my hidden thought divine ? 
Didst thou not feel that I was wholly thine ? 
When for vain glory I forsook thee here. 
Dear as thou wert, unutterably dear. 
From virtue, truth, and innocence estranged, 
To thee, thee only, was my heart unchanged ; 
And as I loved without a hope before. 
Without a hope I loved thee yet the more. 
At length, when, weary of the ways of men. 
Refuge I sought in this maternal glen, 
Thy sweet remembrance drew me from afar. 
And Zillah's beauty was my leading star. 
Here when I found thee, fear itself grew bold, 
Methought my tale of love already told ; 
But soon thine eyes the dream of folly broke. 
And I from bliss, as they from slumber, woke; 
My heart, my tongue, were chill'd to instant stone, 
I durst not speak thy name, nor give my own. 



THE WORLD BEFORK THE FLOOD. 



When thou wert vanish'd, horror and affright 
Seized me, my sins uprose before my siffht ; 
Like fiends they rush'd upon me ; but Despair 
Wrung from expiring Failli a broken prayer; 
Strength came ; the path to Enoch's bower I trod ; 
He saw me, met me, led me back to God. 

Zilhih ! while I sought my Maker's grace, 
And flesh and spirit fail'd before His face. 
Thy tempting image from my breast I drove, 
It was no season then for earthly love." 

"For earthly love it is no season now," 
Exclaim'd the maiden with reproachful brow. 
And eyes through tears of tenderness that shone, 
And voice, half peace, half anger, in its tone : 
" Freely thy past unkindness I forgive ; 
Content to perish here, so Javan live ; 
The tyrant's menace to our tribe we knoAV : 
The Patriarchs never seek, nor shun a foe ; 
Thou, while thou may'st, from swift destruction fly ! 

1 and my father's house resolve to die." 

" With thee and with thy father's house, to bear 
Death or captivity, is Javan's prayer ; 
Remorse for ever be the recreant's lot; 
If I forsake thee now, I love thee not." 

Thus while he vow'd, a gentle answer sprung 
To Zillah's lips, but died upon her tongue ; 
Trembling she turn'd, and hasten'd to the rock, 
Beyond those woods, that hid her folded flock. 
Whose bleatings reach'd her ear, with loud complaint 
Of her delay ; she loosed them from restraint ; 
Then bounding headlong forth, with antic glee. 
They roam'd in all the joy of liberty. 
Javan beside her walk'd as in a dream, 
Nor more of love renew'd the fruitless theme. 

Forthwith from home, to home, throughout the glen, 
The friends whom once he knew he sought again ; 
Each hail'd the stranger welcome at his board, 
As lost but found, as dead to life restored. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



From Eden's camp no tidings came; the day 
In awful expectation pass'd away. 
At eve his harp the fond enthusiast strung-, 
On Adam's mount, and to the Patriarchs sung; 
While youth and age, an eager throng, admire 
The mingling music of the voice and lyre. 

"I love thee. Twilight ! as thy shadows roll. 
The calm of evening steals upon my soul, 
Sublimely tender, solemnly serene. 
Still as the hour, enchanting as the scene. 
I love thee. Twilight I for thy gleams impart 
Their dear, their dying influence to my heart. 
When o'er the harp of thought thy passing wind • 
Awakens all the music of the mind, 
And Joy and Sorrow, as the spirit burns. 
And Hope and Memory sweep the chords by turns, 
While Contemplation, on seraphic wings, 
Mounts with the flame of sacrifice, and sings. 
Twilight ! I love thee ; let thy glooms increase 
Till every feeling, every pulse is peace ; 
Slow from the sky the light of day declines, 
Clearer within the dawn of glory shines. 
Revealing, in the hour of Nature's rest, 
A world of wonders in the poet's breast ; 
Deeper, O Twilight! then thy shadows roll, 
An awful vision opens on my soul. 

"On such an evening, so divinely calm, 
The woods all melody, the breezes balm, 
Down in a vale, where lucid waters stray'd. 
And mountain-cedars stretch'd their downward shade, 
Jubal, the Prince of Song, (in youth unknown,) 
Retired to commune with his harp alone ; 
For still he nursed it, like a secret thought. 
Long cherish'd and to late perfection wrought ; — • 
And still with cunning hand, and curious ear, 
Enrich'd, ennobled, and enlarged its sphere. 
Till he had compass'd, in that magic round, 
A soul of harmony, a heaven of sound. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



Then sang- the minstrel, in his laurel bower, 

Of Nature's origin, and music's power. 

— ' He spake, and it was done ; — Eternal Night, 

At God'^ command, awaken'd into light; 

He call'd the elements. Earth, Ocean, Air, 

He call'd them when they were not, and they were : 

He look'd through space, and kindling o'er the sky, 

Sun, moon, and stars, came forth to meet his eye : 

His spirit moved upon the desert earth. 

And sudden life through all things swarm'd to birth; 

Man from the dust he raised to rule the whole ; 

He breathed, and man became a living soul : 

Through Eden's groves the Lord of Nature trod. 

Upright and pure, the image of his God. 

Thus were the heavens and all their host display'd, 

In wisdom thus were earth's foundations laid ; 

The glorious scene a holy Sabbath closed. 

Amidst his works the Omnipotent reposed ; 

And while he view'd, and bless'd them from his seat, 

All Avorlds, all beings worshipp'd at his feet; 

The morning stars in choral concert sang, 

The rolling deep with hallelujahs rang, 

Adoring angels from their orbs rejoice, 

The voice of music was Creation's voice. 

" ' Alone along the lyre of Nature sigh'd 
The master-chord, to which no chord replied : 
For Man, while bliss and beauty reign'd around, 
For Man alone no fellowship was found. 
No fond companion, in whose dearer breast 
His heart, repining in his own, might rest; 
For, born to love, the heart delights to roam, 
A. kindred bosom is its happiest home. 
On earth's green lap, the Father of mankind, 
In mild dejection, thoughtfully reclined ; 
Soft o'er his eyes a sealing slumber crept. 
And Fancy soothed him while Reflection slept. 
Then God — who thus would make his counsel known, 
Counsel that will'd not man to dwell alone — 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



Created Woman with a smile of grace, 

And left the smile that made her on her face. 

The Patriarch's eyelids open'd on his bride, 

— The morn of beauty risen from his side ! 

He gazed with new-born rapture on her charms, 

And Love's first whispers won her to his arms, 

Then, tuned through all the chords supremely sweet, 

Exulting nature found her lyre complete, 

And from the key of each harmonious sphere 

Struck music worthy of her Maker's ear.' 

" Here Jubal paused ; for grim before him lay, 
Couch'd like a lion watching for his prey, 
: With blood-red eye of fascinating fire, 

I Fix'd, like the gazing serpent's, on the lyre, 

' An awful form, that through the gloom appear'd, 

I Half brute, half human; whose terrific beard, 

' And hoary flakes of long, dishevell'd hair. 

Like eagle's plumage ruffled by the air, 
i Veil'd a sad wreck of grandeur and of grace, 

i Limbs worn and wounded, a majestic face, 

i Deep-plough'd by Time, and ghastly pale with woes, 

; That goaded till remorse to madness rose ; 

Haunted by phantoms, he had fled his home, 
I With savage beasts in solitude to roam ; 

I Wild as the waves, and wandering as the wind, 

I No art could tame him, and no chains could bind : 

Already seven disastrous years had shed 
Mildew and blast on his unshelter'd head ; 
His brain was smitten by the sun at noon, 
His heart was wither'd by the cold night-moon. 
"'Twas Cain, the sire of nations : — Jubal knew 
j His kindred looks, and tremblingly withdrew; 

He, darting like a blaze of sudden fire, 
Leap'd o'er the space between, and grasp'd the lyre : 
Sooner with life the struggling bard would part. 
And, ere the fiend could tear it from his heart. 
He hurl'd his hand with one tremendous stroke. 
O'er all the strings ; Avhence in a whirlwind broke 



Such tones of terror, dissonance, despair, 
As til] that hour had never jarr'd in air. 
Astonish'd into marble at the shock, 
Backward stood Cain, unconscious as a rock. 
Cold, breathless, motionless through all his frame ; 
But soon his visage quickcn'd into flame. 
When Jubal's hand the crashing jargon changed 
To melting harmony, and nimbi}' ranged 
From chord to chord, ascending sweet and clear, 
Then rolling down in thunder on the ear; 
With power the pulse of anguish to restrain. 
And charm the evil spirit from the brain. 

" Slowly recovering from that trance profound, 
Bewilder'd, touch'd, transported with the sound, 
Cain view'd himself, the bard, the earth, the sky, 
While wonder flash'd and faded in his eye. 
And reason, by alternate frenzy crost. 
Now seem'd restored, and now for ever lost. 
So shines the moon; by glimpses, through her shrouds, 
When Avindy Darkness rides upon the clouds, 
Till through the blue, serene, and silent night. 
She reigns in full tranquillity of light. 
Jubal, with eager hope, beheld the chase 
Of strange emotions hurrying o'er his face. 
And waked his noblest numbers to control 
The tide and tempest of the maniac's soul : 
Through many a maze of melody they flew. 
They rose like incense, they distill'd like dew, 
Pour'd through the sufferer's breast delicious balm, 
And soothed remembrance till remorse grew calm. 
Till Cain forsook the solitary wild. 
Led by the minstrel like a weaned child. 
Oh ! had you seen him to his home restored, 
How young and old ran forth to meet their lord ; 
How friends and kindred on his neck did fall, 
Weeping aloud, while Cain outwept them all : 
But hush! — thenceforward when recoiling care 
Lower'd on his brow, and sadden'd to despair. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



The lyre of Jubal, with divinest art, 
Repell'd the demon, and revived his heart. 
Thus Song, the breath of heaven, had power to bind 
In chains of harmony the mightiest mind ; 
Thus Music's empire in the soul began. 
The first-born Poet ruled the first-born Man." 
While Javan sang, the shadows fell around, 
The moving glow-worm brightcn'd on the ground: 
He ceased : the mute assembly rose in tears; 
Delight and wonder were chastised with fears ; 
That heavenly harmony, unheard before. 
Awoke the feeling, — " Who shall hear it more ?" 
The sun had set in glory on their sight. 
For them in vain might morn restore the light; 
Though self-devoted, through each mortal frame, 
At thought of death, a cold, sick shuddering came, 
Nature's infirmity ; — but faith was given, 
The flame that lifts the sacrifice to heaven : 
Through doubt and darkness then beyond the skies, 
Eternal prospects open'd on their eyes ; 
Already seem'd the immortal spirit free. 
And Death was swallow'd up in victory. 



CANTO SEVENTH. 

The Patriarchs and their Families carried away captine by a Detachment from the 
Army of the Invaders — The Tumb of Abel : his Murder by Cain described — The 
Origin of the Oianls : the Infancy and early Adventures of their King: the 
Leader of their Host encamped in Eden. 

The flocks and herds throughout the glen reposed; 
No human eyelid there in slumber closed ; 
None, save the infant's on the mother's breast ; — 
With arms of love caressing and carest ; 
She, while her elder offspring round her clung. 
Each eye intent on hers, and mute each tongue, 
The voice of Death in every murmur heard, 
And felt his touch ia every limb that stirr'd. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



At midnight, down the forest hills, a train 
Of eager warriors from the host of Cain, 
Burst on the stillness of the scene : — they spread 
In bands, to clutch the victims ere they fled: 
Of flight unmindful, at their summons, rose 
Those victims, meekly yielding to their foes ; 
Though woman wept to leave her home behind, 
The weak were comforted, the strong resign'd. 
And ere the moon descending o'er the vale, 
Grew, at the bright approach of morning, pale, 
Collected thus, the patriarchal clan. 
With strengthen'd confidence their march began. 
Since not in ashes were their dwellings laid. 
And death, though threaten'd still, was still delay'd. 
Struck with their fearless innocence, they saw 
Their fierce assailants check'd with sacred awe ; 
The foe became a phalanx of defence, 
And brought them, like a guard of angels, thence. 
A vista-path, that through the forest led, 
(By Javan shunn'd when from the camp he fled,) 
The pilgrims track'd till on the mountain's height 
They met the sun new risen, in glorious light ; 
Empurpled mists along the landscape roU'd, 
And all the orient flamed with clouds of gold. 

Here, while they halted, on their knees they raise 
To God the sacrifice of prayer and praise ; 
— " Glory to Thee, for every blessing shed, 
In days of peace, on our protected head ; 
Glory to Thee, for fortitude to bear 
The wrath of man, rejoicing o'er despair; 
Glory to Thee, whatever ill befall. 
For faith on thy victorious name to call ; 
Thine own eternal purposes fulfil ; 
We come, O God ! to suffer all thy will." 

Refresh'd and rested, on their course they went, 
Ere the clouds melted from the firmament; 
Odours abroad the wings of morning breathe, 
And fresh with dew the herbage sprang beneath; 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



Down from the hills, that gently sloped away 

To the broad river shining into day, 

They pass'd, along the brink the path they kept, 

Where high aloof o'er-arching willows wept, 

Whose silvery foilage glisten'd in the beam. 

And floating shadows fringed the chequer'd stream. 

Adjacent rose a myrtle-planted mound. 
Whose spiry top, a granite fragment crown'd ; 
Tinctured with many colour'd moss, the stone. 
Rich as a cloud of summer-evening, shone 
Amidst encircling verdure, that array'd 
The beauteous hillock with a cope of shade. 

" Javan !" said Enoch, " on this spot began 
The fatal curse ; — man perish'd here by man ; 
The earliest death a son of Adam died 
Was murder, and that murder fratricide ! 
Here Abel fell a corse along this shore ; 
Here Cain's recoiling footsteps reek'd with gore : 
Horror upraised his locks, unloosed his knees ; 
He heard a voice ; he hid among the trees : 
— ' Where is thy brother ?' — From the whirlwind came 
The voice of God amidst enfolding flame : 
— 'Am I my brother's keeper?' — hoarse and low, 
Cain mutter'd from the copse, — ' that I should know V 
— 'What hast thou done ? — For vengeance to the skies, 
Lo ! from the dust the blood of Abel cries : 
Curst from the earth that drank his blood, with toil 
Thine hand shall plough in vain her barren soil, 
An exile and a wanderer thou shalt be ; 
A brother's eye shall never look on thee.' — 

"The shuddering culprit answer'd in despair, 
— 'Greater the punishment than flesh can bear.' 
— ' Yet shalt thou bear it ; on thy brow reveal'd, 
Thus be thy sentence and thy safeguard seal'd.' 
Silently, swiftly as the lightning's blast, 
A hand of fire athwart his temples pass'd : 
He ran, as in the terror of a dream, 
To quench his burning anguish in the stream; 



172 THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 

But bending o'er the brink, the swelling wave 
Back to the eye his branded visage gave ; 
As soon on murder'd Abel durst he look ; 
Yet power to fly his palsied limbs forsook ; 
There turn'd to stone for his presumptuous crime, 
A monument of wrath to latest time. 
Might Cain have stood : but Mercy raised his head 
In prayer for help, — his strength return'd, — he fled. 
That mound of myrtles o'er their favourite child, 
Eve planted, and the hand of Adam piled ; 
Yon mossy stone, above his ashes raised. 
His altar once, with Abel's offering blazed. 
When God well pleased beheld the flames arise. 
And smiled acceptance on the sacrifice." 

Enoch to Javan, walking at his side, 
Thus held discourse apart : the youth replied : 
"Relieved from toil, though Cain is gone to rest. 
And the turf flowers on his disburden'd breast, 
Amongst his race the murdering spirit reigns. 
But riots fiercest in the giants' veins. [combined 

— Sprung from false leagues, when monstrous love 
The sons of God and daughters of mankind. 
Self-styled the progeny of heaven and earth, 
Eden first gave the world's oppressors birth ; 
Thence far away, beneath the rising moon, 
Or where the shadow vanishes at noon, 
The adulterous mothers from the sires withdrew : 
— Nurst in luxuriant climes their offspring grew ; 
Till, ds in stature o'er mankind they tower'd. 
And giant-strength all mortal strength o'erpower'd. 
To heaven the proud blasphemers raise their eyes, 
And scorn'd the tardy vengeance of the skies : 
On earth invincible, they sternly broke 
Love's willing bonds, and Nature's kindred yoke, 
Mad for dominion, with remorseless sway, 
Compell'd their reptile-brethren to obey, 
And doom'd their human herds, with thankless toil, 
Like brutes, to grow and perish on the soil, 



Their sole inheritance, through lingering years, 
The bread of misery and the cup of tears, 
The tasks of oxen, with the hire of slaves, 
Dishonour'd lives, and desecrated graves. 

" When war, that self-inflicted scourge of man, 
His boldest crime and bitterest curse, — began ; 
As lions fierce, as forest-cedars tall. 
And terrible as torrents, in their fall. 
Headlong from rocks, through vales and vineyards hurl'd, 
These men of prey laid waste the eastern world ; 
They taught their tributary hordes to wield 
The sword, red-flaming, through the death-strown field. 
With strenuous arm the uprooted rock to throw. 
Glance the light arrow from the bounding bow, 
Whirl the broad shield to meet the darted stroke, 
And stand to combat, like the unyielding oak. 
Then eye from eye with fell suspicion turn'd, 
In kindred breasts unnatural hatred burn'd : 
Brother met brother in the lists of strife. 
The son lay lurking for the father's life ; 
With rabid instinct, men who never knew 
Each other's face before, each other slew ; 
All tribes, all nations learn'd the fatal art. 
And every hand was arm'd to pierce a heart. 
Nor man alone the giants' might subdued ; 
— The camel wean'd from quiet solitude, 
C4razed round their camps, or slow along the road. 
Midst marching legions bore the servile load. 
With flying forelock and dishevell'd mane. 
They caught the wild steed prancing o'er the plain. 
For war or pastime rein'd his fiery force ; 
Fleet as the wind he stretch'd along the course, 
Or loudly neighing at the trumpet's soimd, 
With hoofs of thunder smote the indented ground. 
The enormous elephant obey'd their will, 
And, tamed to cruelty Avith direst skill, 
Roar'd for the battle, when he felt the goad. 
And his proud lord his sinewy neck bestrode, 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



Through crashing- ranks resistless havoc bore, 

And writhed his trunk, and bathed his tusks in gore. 

"Thus while the giants trampled friends and foes, 
Amongst their tribe a mighty chieftain rose ; 
His birth mysterious, but traditions tell 
What strange events his infancy befell. 

"A goat-herd fed his flock on many a steep. 
Where Eden's rivers swell the southern deep ; 
A melancholy man, who dwelt alone. 
Yet far abroad his evil fame was known. 
The first of woman born, that might presume 
To wake the dead bones mouldering in the tomb. 
And, from the gull" of uncreated night, 
Call phantoms of futurity to light. 
'Twas said his voice could stay the falling flood. 
Eclipse the sun, and turn the moon to blood. 
Roll back the planets on their golden cars. 
And from the firmament unfix the stars. 
Spirits of fire and air, of sea and land. 
Came at his call, and flew at his command ; 
His spells so potent, that his changing breath 
Open'd or shut the gates of life and death. 
O'er Nature's powers he claim'd supreme control, 
And held communion with all Nature's soul: 
The name and place of every herb he knew, 
Its healing balsam, or pernicious dew : 
The meanest reptile, and the noblest birth 
Of ocean's caverns, or the living earth, 
Obey'd his mandate : — lord of all the rest, 
Man more than all his hidden art confess'd, 
Cringed to his face, consulted, and revered 
His oracles, — detested him and fear'd. 

" Once by the river, in a waking dream. 
He stood to watch the ever-running stream. 
In which, reflected upwards to his eyes. 
He giddily look'd down upon the skies. 
For thus he feign'd in his ecstatic mood, 
To summon divination from the flood. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



His Steady view, a floating object cross'd ; 

His eye pursued it till the sight was lost, — 

An outcast infant in a fragile bark ! 

The river whirl'd the willow-woven ark 

Down tow'rds the deep; the tide returning bore 

The little voyager unharm'd to shore; 

Him in his cradle-ship securely bound 

With swathing skins at eve the goatherd found. 

Nurst by that foster-sire, austere and rude, 

Midst rocks and glens, in savage solitude, 

Among the kids, the rescued foundling grew. 

Nutrition from whose shaggy dams he drew, 

Till baby-curls his broader. temples crown'd. 

And torrid suns his flexile limbs embrown'd : 

Then as he sprang from green to florid age, 

And rose to giant-stature, stage by stage, 

He roam'd the valleys with his browsing flock. 

And leapt in joy of youth from rock to rock ; 

Climb'd the sharp precipice's steepest breast, 

To seize the eagle brooding on her nest. 

And rent his way through matted woods, to tear 

The skulking panther from his hidden lair. 

A trodden serpent, horrible and vast, 

Sprang on the heedless rover as he pass'd ; 

Limb lock'd o'er limb, with many a straitening fold 

Of orbs inextricably involved, he roll'd 

On earth in vengeance, broke the twisted toils. 

Strangled the hissing fiend, and wore the spoils. 

With hardy exercise, and cruel art, 

To nerve the frame, and petrify the heart. 

The wizard train'd his pupil, from a span. 

To thrice the bulk and majesty of man. 

His limbs were sinewy strength; commanding grace. 

And dauntless spirit sparkled in his face ; 

His arm could pluck the lion from his prey, 

And hold the horn'd rhinoceros at bay ; 

His feet o'er highest hills pursue the hind. 

Or tire the ostrich buoyant on the wind. 



TUE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



"Yet 'twas the stripling's chief delight to brave 
The rivers' wrath, and wrestle with the wave ; 
When torrent rains had swoln the furious tide, 
Light on the foamy surge he loved to ride ; 
When calm and clear the stream was wont to flow, 
Fearless he dived to search the caves below. 
His childhood's story, often told, had wrought 
Sublimest hopes in his aspiring thought. 
— Once on a cedar, from its mounlain-throne 
Pluckt by the tempest, forth he sail'd alone, 
And reach'd the gulf: — with eye of eager fire, 
And flushing cheek, he watch'd the shores retire, 
Till sky and water wide around were spread ; 
— Straight to the sun he thought his voyage led. 
With shouts of transport hail'd its setting light, 
And foUow'd all the long and lonely night 
But ere the morning-star expired, he found 
His stranded bark once more on earthly ground. 
Tears, wrung from secret shame, suffused his eyes. 
When in the east he saw the sun arise ; 
Pride quickly check'd them — young ambition burn'd 
For bolder enterprise, as he return'd. 

"Through snares and deaths pursuing fame and power. 
He scorn'd his flock from that adventurous hour. 
And, leagued with monsters of congenial birth. 
Began to scourge and subjugate the earth. 
Meanwhile the sons of Cain, who till'd the soil, 
By noble arts had loarn'd to lighten toil; 
Wisely their scatter'd knowledge he combined ; 
Yet had an hundred years matured his mind, 
Ere with the strength that laid the forest low, 
And skill that made the iron furnace glow. 
His genius launcli'd the keel, and sway'd the helm, 
(His throne and sceptre on the watery realm,) 
While from the tent of his expanded sail. 
He eyed the heavens and flew before the gale, 
The first of men whose courage knew to guide 
The boundino; vessel through tlie refluent tide. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



Then sware the giant, in his pride of soul, 
To range the universe from pole to pole. 
Rule the remotest nations with his nod, 
To live a hero, and to die a god. 

" This is the king that wars in Eden : — now 
Fulfill'd at length he deems his early vow; 
His foot hath over-run the world, — his hand 
Smitten to dust the pride of every land: 
The Patriarchs last, beneath his impious rod, 
He dooms to perish or abjure their God. 
— O God of truth! rebuke the tyrant's rage. 
And save the remnant of thine heritage." 

When Javan ceased, they stood upon the height. 
Where first he rested on his lonely flight. 
Whence to the sacred mountain far away, 
The land of Eden in perspective lay. 
'Twas noon ; — they tarried there, till milder hours 
Woke with licrht airs the breath of evening flowers. 



CANTO EIGHTH. 

The Scene chavgcs to a Mountain, on the Summit of which, beneath the Shade of 
ancient Trees, the Oiants are assembled round their King — i Minstrel sings the 
Monarch's Praises, and describes the Destruction of the Remnant of the Force of 
his Knemies, in an Jlssault, by Land and Water, on their Encampment, between 
the Forest on the eastern Plain of Eden and the River to the IVest — The Captive 
Patriarchs are presented before the King and his Chieftains. 

" There is a living spirit in the Lyre, 
A breath of music and a soul of fire ; 
It speaks a language to the world unknown ; 
It speaks that language to the Bard alone ; 
While warbled symphonies entrance his ears, 
That spirit's voice in every tone he hears ; 
'Tis his the mystic meaning to rehearse. 
To utter oracles in glowing verse. 
Heroic themes from age to age prolong. 
And make the dead in nature live in soncr. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



Though graven rocks the warrior's deeds proclaim, 

And mountains, hewn to statues, wear his name ; 

Though, shrined in adamant, his relics lie 

Beneath a pyramid, that scales the sky ; 

All that the hand hath fashion'd shall decay ; 

All that the eye admires shall pass away ; 

The mouldering rocks, the hero's hope shall fail. 

Earthquakes shall heave the mountains to the vale, 

The shrine of adamant betray its trust, 

And the proud pyramid resolve to dust ; 

The Lyre alone immortal fame secures. 

For Song alone through Nature's change endures , — 

Transfused like life, from breast to breast it glows, 

From sire to son by sure succession flows. 

Speeds its unceasing flight from clime to clime. 

Outstripping Death upon the wings of Time. 

" Soul of the Lyre ! whose magic power can raise 
Inspiring visions of departed days ; — 
Or, with the glimpses of mysterious rhyme, 
Dawn on the dreams of unawaken'd Time ; 
Soul of the Lyre ! instruct thy bard to sing 
The latest triumph of the Giant-king, 
Who sees this day his orb of glory fiU'd ; 
— In what creative numbers shall I build. 
With what exalted strains of music crown. 
His everlasting pillar of renown ? 
Though, like the rainbow, by a wondrous birth, 
He sprang to light, the joy of heaven and earth; 
Though, like the rainbow, — for he cannot die, — 
His form shall pass unseen into the sky ; 
Say, shall the hero share the coward's lot. 
Vanish from earth ingloriously forgot ? 
No ! the divinity that rules the Lyre, 
And clothes these lips with eloquence of fire. 
Commands the song to rise in quenchless flame, 
And light the world for ever with his fame." 

Thus on a mountain's venerable head. 
Where trees, coeval with creation, spread 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



Their massy-twisted branches, green and gray, 
Mature below, their tops in dry decay, 
A bard of Jubal's lineage proudly sung, 
Then stay'd awhile the raptures of his tongue ; 
A shout of horrible applause, that rent 
The echoing hills and answering firmament, 
Burst from the Giants, — where, in barbarous state, 
Flush'd with new wine, around their king they sate ; 
A chieftain each, who, on his brazen car. 
Had led an host of meaner men to war; 
And now from recent fight on Eden's plain, 
Where fell their foes, in helpless conflict slain. 
Victoriously return'd, beneath the trees 
They rest from toil, carousing at their ease. 

Adjacent, where the mountaiji's spacious breast 
Open'd in airy grandeur to the west. 
Huge piles of fragrant cedars, on the ground. 
As altars blazed, while victims bled around, 
To gods, whose worship vanish'd with the Flood, 
— Divinities of brass, and stone, and wood, 
By man himself in his own image made ; 
The fond creator to the creature pray'd ! 
And he, who from the forest or the rock 
Hew'd the rough mass, adored the shapen block ! 
Then seem'd his flocks ignoble in his eyes, 
His choicest herds too mean for sacrifice. 
He pour'd his brethren's blood upon the pyre, 
And pass'd his sons to demons through the fire. 

Exalted o'er the vassal chiefs, behold 
Their sovereign, cast in Nature's mightiest mould ; 
Beneath an oak, whose woven boughs display'd 
A verdant canopy of light and shade. 
Throned on a rock the Giant-king appears. 
In the full manhood of five hundred years ; 
His robe, the spoils of lions, by his might 
Dragg'd from their dens, or slain in chase or fight : 
His raven locks, unblanch'd by withering Time, 
Amply dishevell'd o'er his brow sublime ; 



180 THE WORLD BEFORF. THE FLOOD. 

His dark eyes, flush'd with restless radiance, gleam 

Like broken moonlig-ht rippling on the stream. 

Grandeur of soul, which nothing might appal. 

And nothing satisfy if less than all. 

Had stamp'd upon his air, his form, his face, 

The character of calm and awful grace ; 

But direst cruelty, by guile represt, 

Lurk'd in the dark volcano of his breast, 

In silence brooding, like the secret power 

That springs the earthquake at the midnight hour. 

From Eden's summit, with obdurate pride. 
Red from afar, the battle-scene he eyed, 
Where late he crush'd, with one remorseless blow. 
The remnant of his last and noblest foe ; 
At hand he view'd the trophies of his toils. 
Herds, flocks, and steeds, the world's collected spoils ; 
Below, his legions march'd in war array, 
Unstain'd with blood in that unequal fray : 
— An hundred tribes, whose sons their arms had borne 
Without contention, from the field at morn. 
Their bands dividing, when the fight was won, 
Darken'd the region tow'rds the slanting sun, 
Like clouds, whose shadows o'er the landscape sail, 
— While to their camp, that fill'd the northern vale, 
A waving sea of tents, immensely spread. 
The trumpet summon'd, and the banners led. 
With these a train of captives, sad and slow, 
Moved to a death of shame, or life of woe, 
A death on altars hateful to the skies. 
Or life in chains, a slower sacrifice. 
Fair smiled the face of Nature ; — all serene 
And lovely. Evening tranquillized the scene; 
The furies of the fight were gone to rest. 
The cloudless sun grew broader down the west. 
The hills beneath him melted from the sight, 
Receding through the heaven of purple light ; 
Along the plain the maze of rivers roU'd, 
And verdant shadows glcam'd in waves of gold. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



Thus while the tyrant cast his haughty eye 
O'er the broad landscape and incumbent sky. 
His heart exuking- whisper'd — "All is mine," 
And heard a voice from all things answer "Thine." 
Such was the matchless chief, whose name of yore 
Fill'd the wide world : — his name is known no more : 
O that for ever from the rolls of fame, 
Like his, had perish'd every conqueror's name ! 
Then had mankind been spared, in after-times. 
Their greatest sufferings and their greatest crimes. 
The hero scourges not his age alone, 
His curse to late posterity is known : 
He slays his thousands with his living breath, 
His tens of thousands by his fame in death. 
Achilles quench'd not all his wrath on Greece, 
Through Homer's songs its miseries never cease ; 
Like Phoebus' shafts, the bright contagion brings 
Plagues on the people for the feuds of kings. 
'Twas not in vain the son of Philip sigh'd 
For Avorlds to conquer, — o'er the western tide, 
His spirit, in the Spaniard's form, o'erthrew 
Realms that the Macedonian never knew. 
The steel of Brutus struck not Caesar dead ; 
Csesar in other lands hath raised his head. 
And fought, of friends and foes, on many a plain, 
His millions, captured, fugitive, and slain ; 
Yet seldom suffer'd, where his country died, 
A Roman vengeance for his parricide. 

The sun was sunk ; the sacrificial pyres 
From smouldering ashes breathed their last blue fires, 
The 'Smiling star, that lights the world to rest, 
Walk'd in the rosy gardens of the west, 
Like Eve erewhile through Eden's blooming bowers, 
A lovelier star amidst a heaven of flowers. 
Now in the freshness of the falling shade. 
Again the minstrel to the monarch play'd. 
— "Where is the youth renown'd? — the youth whose voice 
Was wont to make the listening camp rejoice, 



182 THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



When to his harp, in many a peerless strain, 
He sang the wonders of the Giant's reign: 
Oh where is Javan?"— Thus the bard renew'd 
His lay, and with a rival's transport view'd 
The cioud of sudden anger, that o'ercame 
The tyrant's countenance at Javan's name ; 
Javan, whose song was once his soul's delight, 
Now doom'd a traitor recreant by his flight. 
The envious minstrel smiled ; then boldly ran 
His prelude o'er the chords, and thus began : — 

" 'Twas on the morn that faithless Javan fled, 
To yonder plain the king of nations led 
His countless hosts, and stretch'd their wide array 
Along the woods, within whose shelter lay 
The sons of Eden:*— these, with secret pride, 
In ambush thus the Invincible defied : 

'Girt with the forest wherefore should we fear? 

The Giant's sword shall never reach us here : 

Behind, the river rolls its deep defence ; 

The Giant's hand shall never pluck us hence.' 

Vain boast of fools ! who to that hand prepare 

For their own lives the inevitable snare : 

His legions smote the standards'of the wood, 

And with their prostrate strength controU'd the flood 

Lopt off their boughs, and jointed beam to beam, 

The pines and oaks were launch'd upon the stream, 

An hundred rafts.— Yet still within a zone 

Of tangled coppices, — a waste, o'ergrown 

With briers and thorns, — the dauntless victims lie, 

Scorn to surrender, and prepare to die. 

The second sun went down ; the monarch's plan 

Was perfected : the dire assault began. 

"Marshall'd by twilight, his obedient bands 
Engirt the wood, with torches in their hands ; 
The signal given, they shoot them through the air; 
The blazing brands in rapid volleys glare, 



* Vide Canto I. p. H8, and Canto 111. p. 139. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



Descending through the gloom with spangled light, 

As if the stars were falling through the night, 

Along the wither'd grass the wild-fire flew, 

Higher and hotter with obstruction grew ; 

The green wood hiss'd ; from crackling thickets broke 

Light-glancing flame, and heavy-rolling smoke ; 

Till all the breadth of forest seem'd to rise 

In blazing conflagration to the skies. 

Fresh o'er our heads the winds propitious blow, 

But roll the fierce combustion on the foe. 

Awhile they paused, of every hope bereft. 

Choice of destruction all their refuge left ; 

If from the flames they fled, behind them lay 

The river roaring to receive his prey ; 

If through the stream they sought the farther strand, 

Our rafts were moor'd to meet them ere they land ; 

With triple death environ'd thus they stood, 

Till nearer peril drove them to the flood. 

Safe on a hill, where sweetest moonlight slept, 

As o'er the changing scene my watch I kept, 

I heard their shrieks of agony ; I hear 

Those shrieks still ring in my tormented ear; 

I saw them leap the gulf«with headlong fright ; 

Oh that mine eyes could now forget that sight ! 

They sank in multitude ; but prompt to save. 

Our warriors snatch'd the stragglers from the wave, 

And on their rafts a noble harvest bore 

Of rescued heroes, captive to the shore. 

" One little troop their lessening ground maiutain'd 
Till space to perish in alone remain'd ; 
Then with a shout that rent the echoing air, 
More like the shout of victory than despair. 
Wedged in a solid phalanx, man by man. 
Right through the scorching wilderness they ran, 
Where half extinct the smouldering fuel glow'd, 
And levell'd copses strew'd the open road. 
Unharm'd as spirits while they seem'd to pass. 
Their lighted features flared like molten brass, 



84 THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 

Around the flames in writhing- volumes spread, 
Thwarted their path, or mingled o'er their head ; 
Beneath their feet the fires to ashes turn'd. 
But in their wake with mounting fury burn'd. 
Our host recoil'd from that amazing sight; 
Scarcely the king himself restrain'd their flight; 
He, with his chiefs, in brazen armour, stood 
Unmoved, to meet the maniacs from the wood. 
Dark as a thunder-cloud their phalanx came. 
But split like lightning into forms of flame ; 
Soon as in })urer air their heads they raised 
To taste the breath of heaven, their garments blazed ; 
Then blind, distracted, weaponless, yet flush'd 
With dreadful valour, on their foes they rushed ; 
The Giants met them midway on the plain ; 
'Twas but the struggle of a moment ; — slain. 
They fell; their relics, to the flames return'd. 
As offerings to the inmiortal gods were burn'd ; 
And never did the light of morning rise 
Upon the clouds of such a sacrifice." 

Abruptly here the minstrel ceased to sing, 
And every face was turn'd upon the king; 
He, while the stoutest hearts recoil'd with fear, 
And Giants trembled their own deeds to hear. 
Unmoved and unrelenting, in his mind 
Deeds of more impious enterprise design'd: 
A dire conception labour'd in his breast; 
His eye was sternly pointed to the west. 
Where stood the mount of Paradise sublime, 
Whose guarded top, since man's presumptuous crime. 
By noon, a dusky cloud appear'd to rise. 
But blazed a beacon through nocturnal skies. 
As yEtna, view'd from ocean far away. 
Slumbers in blue revolving smoke by day. 
Till darkness, with terrific splendour, shows 
The eternal fires that crest the eternal snows ; 
So where the cherubim in vision turn'd 
Their flaming swords, the summit lower'd or burn'd. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



And now conspicuous through the twilight gloom, 
The glancing beams the distant hills illume, 
And, as the shadows deepen o'er the ground. 
Scatter a red and wavering lustre round. 

Awhile the monarch, fearlessly amazed, 
With jealous anger on the glory gazed ; 
Already had his arm in battle hurl'd 
His thunders round the subjugated world ; 
Lord of the nether universe, his pride 
Was rein'd, Avhile Paradise his power defied. 
An upland isle, by meeting streams embraced. 
It tower'd to heaven amidst a sandy waste; 
Below, impenetrable woods display'd 
Depths of mysterious solitude and shade ; 
Above, with adamantine bulwarks crovvn'd, 
Primeval rocks in hoary masses frown'd ; 
O'er all were seen the cherubim of light. 
Like pillar'd flames amidst the falling night; 
So high it rose, so bright the mountain shone, 
It seem'd the footstool of Jehovah's throne. 

The Giant panted with intense desire 
To scale those heights, and storm the walls of fire 
His ardent soul, in ecstasy of thought, 
Even now with Michael and his angels fought. 
And saw the seraphim, like meteors, driven 
Before his banners through the gates of heaven, 
While he secure the glorious garden trod, 
And sway'd his sceptre from the mount of God. 

When suddenly the bard had ceased to sing, 
While all the chieftains gazed upon their king. 
Whose changing looks a rising storm bespoke, 
Ere from his lips the dread explosion broke, 
The trumpets sounded, and before his face 
Were led the captives of the Patriarchs' race, 
— A lovely and a venerable band 
Of young and old, amidst their foes they stand; 
Unawed they see the fiery trial near ; 
They fear'd their God, and knew no other fear. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD, 



To light the dusky scene, resplendent fires, 
Of pine and cedar, blazed in lofty pyres ; 
While from the east the moon with doubtful gleams 
Now tipt the hills, now glanced athwart the streams. 
Till, darting through the clouds her beauteous eye. 
She open'd all the temple of the sky; 
The Giants, closing in a narrower ring, 
By turns survey'd the prisoners and the king. 
Javan stood forth ; — lo all the youth was known. 
And every eye was fix'd on him alone. 



CANTO NINTH. 



The King's Determination to sacrifice the Patriarchs and their Families to his 
Demon-Oods — His Sentence on Javan— Zillah's Distress — The Sorcerer pre- 
tends to declare the Secret of the Birth of tlie King, and proposes his Deification — 
Enoch appears. 

A GLEAM of joy, at that expected sight. 

Shot o'er the monarch's brow with baleful light : 

"Behold," thought he, "the great decisive hour; 

Ere morn, these sons of God shall prove my power : 

Offer d by me their blood shall be the price 

Of demon-aid to conquer Paradise." 

Thus while he threaten'd, Javan caught his view, 

And instantly his visage changed its hue ; 

Inflamed with rage past utterance, he frown'd, 

He gnash'd his teeth, and wildly glared around. 

As one who saw a spectre in the air, 

And durst not look upon it, nor forbear; 

Still on the youth, his eye, Avherever cast, 

Abhorrently return'd, and fix'd at last : 

" Slaves ! smite the traitor ; be his limbs consign'd. 

To flames, his ashes scatter'd to the wind !" 

He cried in tones so vehement, so loud, 

Instinctively recoil'd the shuddering crowd; 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



And ere the guards to seize their victim rush'd, 

The youth was pleading — every breath was hush'd ; 

Pale, but undauntedly, he faced his foes ; 

Warm as he spoke his kindling spirit rose ; 

Well pleased, on him the Patriarch-fathers smiled, 

And every mother loved him as her child. 

"Monarch ! to thee no traitor, here I stand; 
These are my brethren, this my native land ; 
My native land, by sword and fire consumed, 
My brethren captive, and to death foredoom'd ; 
To these indeed a rebel in my youth, 
A fugitive apostate from the truth. 
Too late repentant, I confess my crime, 
And mourn o'er lost irrevocable time, 
— When from thy camp by conscience urged to flee, 
I plann'd no wrong, I laid no snare for thee : 
Did I provoke these sons of innocence. 
Against thine arms, to rise in vain defence ? 
No; I conjured them, ere this threaten'd hour, 
In sheltering forests to escape thy power; 
Firm in their rectitude, they scorn'd to fly ; 
Thy foes they were not, — they resolved to die. 
Yet think not thou, amidst thy warlike bands, 
They lie beyond redemption in thine hands: 
The God in whom they trust may help them still. 
They know he can deliver, and HE WILL ; 
Whether by life or death, afliicts them not. 
On his decree, not thine, they rest their lot. 
For me, unworthy with the just to share 
Death or deliverance, this is Javan's prayer: 
Mercy, O God ! to these in life be shown, 
I die rejoicing, if I die alone." 

"Thou shalt not die alone," a voice replied, 
A well-known voice — 'twas Zillah at his side ; 
She, while ho spake, with eagerness to hear, 
Step after step, unconsciously drew near; 
Her bosom Avith severe compunction wrung, 
Pleased or alarm'd, on every word she hung. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



He turn'd his face ; — with agonizing- air, 

In all the desolation of despair, 

She stood; her hands to heaven uplift and clasp'd, 

Then suddenly unloosed, his arm she grasp'd. 

And thus, in wild apostrophes of wo, 

Vented her grief while tears refused to flow. 

" Oh I have wrong'd thee, Javan ! — Let us be 
Espoused in death : — No, I will die for thee. 
— Tyrant ! behold thy victim ; on my head 
Be all the bitterness of vengeance shed, 
But spare the innocent; let Javan live. 
Whose crime was love: — Can Javan too forgive 
Love's lightest, fondest weakness, maiden-shame, 
— It was not pride, — that hid my bosom-flame ? 
And wilt thou mourn the poor transgressor's death, 
Who says, ' I love thee,' with her latest breath ? 
And when thou think'st of days and years gone by, 
Will thoughts of Zillah sometimes swell thine eye ? 
If ever thou hast cherish'd in thine heart 
Visions of hope in which I bore a part ; 
If ever thou hast long'd v/ith me to share 
One home-born joy, one home-endearing care ; 
If thou didst ever love me ; — speak the word. 
Which late with feign'd indifference I heard ; 
Tell me, thou lov'st me still ; — haste, Javan, mark. 
How high those ruflians pile the faggots, — hark. 
How the flames crackle, — see, how fierce they glare. 
Like fiery serpents hissing through the air; 
Farewell ; I fear them not. — Now seize me, bind 
These willing limbs, — ye cannot touch the mind ; 
Unawed, I stand on Nature's failing brink : 
— Nay, look not on me, Javan, lest I shrink ; 
Give me thy prayers, but turn away thine eye. 
That I may lift my soul to Heaven, and die." 

Thus Zillah raved in passionate distress, 
Till frenzy soften'd into tenderness; 
Sorrow and love, with intermingling grace. 
Terror and beauty, lighten'd o'er her face ; 




Her voice, her eye, in every soul was felt, 

And Giant-hearts Avere moved, unwont to melt. 

Javan, in wonder, pity, and delight. 

Almost forgot his being at the sight ; 

That bending form, those suppliant accents, seem 

The strange illusions of a lover's dream; 

And while she clung upon his arm, he found 

His limbs, his lips, as by enchantment, bound; 

He dare not touch her, lest the charm should break. 

He dare not move, lest he himself should wake. 

But when she ceased to speak, and he to hear. 
The silence startled him ; — cold, shivering fear 
Crept o'er his nerves ; — in thought he cast his eye 
Back on the world, and heaved a bitter sigh, 
Thus from life's sweetest pleasures to be torn, 
Just when he seein'd to new existence born, 
And cease to feel, Avhen feeling ceased to be 
A fever of protracted misery, 
And cease to love, when love no more was pain ; 
'Twas but a pang of transient weakness : — " Vain 
Are all thy sorrows," falteringly he said ; 
" Already I am number'd with the dead ; 
But long and blissfully may Zillah live ! 
— And canst thou 'Javan's cruel scorn' forgive? 
And wilt thou mourn the poor transgressor's death, 
Who says, ' I love thee,' with his latest breath ? 
And when thou think'st of days and years gone by, 
Will thoughts of Javan sometimes swell thine eye ? 
Ah ! v/hile I wither'd in thy chilling frown, 
'Twas easy then to lay life's burden down ; 
When singly sentenced to these flames, my mind 
Gloried in leaving all I loved behind ; 
How hast thou triumph'd o'er me in this hour ! 
One look hath crush'd my soul's collected power; 
Thy scorn I might endure, thy pride def)'. 
But oh thy kindness makes it hard to die !" 

"Then we will die together." — " Zillah ! no, 
Thou shalt not perish ; let me, let me go ; 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



Behold thy parents ! calm thy father's fears ; 
Thy mother weeps ; canst thou resist her tears ?" 

"Away with folly !" in tremendous tone, 
Exclaim'd a voice, more horrid than the groan 
Of famish'd tiger leaping on his prey ; 
— Crouch'd at the monarch's feet the speaker lay ; 
But starling up, in his ferocious mien 
That monarch's ancient foster-sire was seen, 
The goatherd, — he who snatch'd him from the flood, 
The sorcerer, who nursed him up to blood: 
Who, still his evil genius, fully bent 
On one bold purpose, went where'er he went; 
That purpose, long in his own bosom seal'd, 
Ripe for fulfilment now, he thus reveal'd. 
Full in the midst he rush'd ; alarm'd, aghast, 
Giants and captives trembled as he pass'd. 
For scarcely seem'd he of the sons of earth; 
Unchronicled the hour that gave him birth; 
Though shrunk his cheek, his temples deeply plough'd, 
Keen was his vulture-eye, his strength unbow'd ; 
Swarthy his features ; venerably gray 
His beard disheveil'd o'er his bosom lay: 
Bald was his front ; but, white as snow behind, 
His ample locks Avere scatter'd to the wind ; 
Naked he stood, save round his loins a zone 
Of shagged fur, and o'er his shoulders thrown 
A serpent's skin, that cross'd his breast, and round 
His body thrice in glittering volumes wound. 

All gazed with horror, — deep, unulter'd thought 
In every muscle of his visage wrought; 
His eye, as if his eye could see the air. 
Was fix'd : up-wrilhing rose his horrent hair; 
His limbs grew dislocate, convulsed his frame ; 
Deep from his chest m)'^sterious noises came ; 
Now purring, hissing, barking, then they swell'd 
To hideous dissonance ; he shriek'd, he yell'd. 
As if the Legion-fiend his soul possess'd. 
And a whole hell were worrying in his breast; 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



Then down he dash'd himself on earth, and roU'd 

In agony, till powerless, stiff, and cold, 

With face upturn'd to heaven, and arms outspread, 

A ghastly spectacle, he lay as dead : 

The living too stood round like forms of death. 

And every pulse was hush'd, and every breath. 

Meanwhile the wind arose, the clouds Avere driven 
In watery masses through the waste of heaven, 
The groaning woods foretold a tempest nigh. 
And silent lightning skirmish'd in the sky. 

Ere long the wizard started from the ground. 
Giddily reel'd, and look'd bewilder'd round. 
Till on the king he fix'd his hideous gaze ; 
Then rapt with ecstasy, and broad amaze. 
He kneel'd in adoration, humbly bow'd 
His face upon his hands, and cried aloud; 
Yet so remote and strange his accents fell. 
They seem'd the voice of an invisible : 
— " Hail ! king and conqueror of the peopled earth. 
And more than king or conqueror ! Know thy birth : 
Thou art a ray of uncreated fire, 
The sun himself is thy celestial sire ; 
The moon thy mother, who to me consign'd 
Her babe in secrecy, to bless mankind. 
These eyes have w^atch'd thee rising, year by year, 
More great,, more glorious in thine high career. 
As the young eagle plies his growing wings 
In bounded flights, and sails in wider rings, 
Till to the fountain of meridian day. 
Full plumed and perfected, he soars away ; 
Thus have I mark'd thee, since thy course begun, 
Still upward tending to thy sire the sun : 
Now midway meet him ; from yon flaming height, 
Chase the vain phantoms of cherubic light; 
There build a tower, whose spiral top shall rise, 
Circle o'er circle lessening to the skies : 
The stars, thy brethren, in their spheres shall stand 
To hail thee welcome to thy native land : 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



The moon shall clasp thee in her glad embrace, 
The sun behold his image in thy face, 
And call thee, as his offspring and his heir. 
His throne, his empire, and his oib to share." 

Rising and turning his terrific head. 
That chill'd beholders, thus the enchanter said: 
— "Prepare, prepare the piles of sacrifice. 
The power that rules the earth shall rule the skies; 
Hither, O chiefs ! the captive Patriarchs bring, 
And pour their blood an ofiering to your king ; 
He, like his sire the sun, in transient clouds. 
His veil'd divinity from mortals shrouds. 
Too pure to shine till these his foes are slain, 
And conquer'd Paradise hath crown'd his reign. 
Haste, heap the fallen cedars on the pyres. 
And give the victims living to the fires : 
Shall He, in whom they vainly trust, withstand 
Your sovereign's wrath, or pluck them from his hand": 
We dare Him ; — if He saves his servants now. 
To Him let every knee in nature bow. 

For HE is GOD" at that most awful name, 

A spasm of horror wither'd up his frame. 

Even as he stood and look'd ; — he looks, he stands, 

With heaven-defying front, and clenched hands, 

And lips half-open'd, eager from his breast 

To bolt the blasphemy, by force represt ; 

For not in feign'd abstraction, as before. 

He practised foul deceit by damned lore ; 

A frost was on his nerves, and in his veins 

A fire, consuming with infernal pains; 

Conscious, though motionless, his limbs were grown ; 

Alive to suffering, but alive in stone. 

In silent expectation, sore amazed, 
The king and chieftains on the sorcerer gazed ; 
Awhile no sound was heard, save through the woods 
The wind deep-thundering, and the dashing floods : 
At length, with solemn step, amidst the scene. 
Where that false prophet show'd his frantic mien. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



Where lurid flames from green-wood altars burn'd, 

Enoch stood forth ; — on him all eyes were turn'd ; 

O'er his dim form and saintly visage fell 

The light that glared upon that priest of hell. 

Unutterably awful was his look; 

Through every joint the Giant-monarch shook; 

Shook like Belshazzar, in his festive hall, 

When the hand wrote his judgment on the wall;* 

Shook, like Eliphaz, with dissolving fright,! 

In thoughts amidst the visions of the night, 

When as the spirit pass'd before his face. 

Nor limb, nor lineament his eye could trace ; 

A form of mystery, that chill'd his blood, 

Close at his couch in living terror stood, 

And death-like silence, till a voice more drear. 

More dreadful than the silence, reach'd his ear : 

Thus from surrounding darkness Enoch brake, 

And thus the Giant trembled while he spake. 



CANTO TENTH. 



The Prophecy of Enoch concerning the Sorcerer, the King, and the Flood — Hii 
Translation to HeavAi — The Conclusion. 

" The Lord is jealous : — He, who reigns on high, 
Upholds the earth, and spreads abroad the sky ; 
His voice the moon and stars by night obey. 
He sends the sun his servant forth by day : 
From Him all beings came, on Him depend. 
To Him return, their Author, Sovereign, End. 
Who shall destroy when He would save ? or stand, 
When He destroys, the stroke of his right hand ? 
With none His name and power Avill He divide. 
For HE is GOD, and there is none beside. 

" The proud shall perish ; — mark how wild his air 
In impotence of malice and despair, 



t Job iv. 12—21. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



What frenzy fires the bold blasphemer's cheek ! 
He looks the curses which he cannot speak. 
A hand hath touch'd him that he once defied ; 
Touch'd, and for ever crush'd him in his pride ; 
Yet shall he live, despised as fear'd before ; 
The great deceiver shall deceive no more ; 
Children shall pluck the beard of him whose arts 
Palsied the boldest hands, the stoutest hearts ; 
His vaunted wisdom fools shall laugh to scorn. 
When muttering spells, a spectacle forlorn, 
A drivelling idiot, he shall fondly roam 
From house to house, and never find a home." 

The wizard heard his sentence, nor remain'd 
A moment longer ; from his trance unchaiTi'd, 
He plunged into the woods ; — the Prophet then 
Turn'd, and took up his parable again. 

" The proud shall perish : — monarch ! know thy doom ; 
Thy bones shall lack the shelter of a tomb ; 
Not in the battle-field thine eyes shall close, 
Slain upon thousands of thy slaughter'd foes ; 
Not on the throne of empire, nor the bed 
Of weary Nature, thou shalt bow thine head : 
Death lurks in ambush ; Death without a name, 
Shall pluck thee from thy pinnacle of fame ; 
At eve, rejoicing o'er thy finish'd toil. 
Thy soul shall deem the universe her spoil ; 
The dawn shall see thy carcass cast away, 
The wolves, at sunrise, slumber on their prey. 
Cut from the living, whither dost thou go ? 
Hades is moved to meet thee from below ;* 
The kings thy sword had slain, the mighty dead. 
Start from their thrones at thy descending tread ; 
They ask in scorn, — ' Destroyer ! is it thus ? 
Art thou, — thou too, — become like one of us ? 
Torn from the feast of music, wine, and mirth. 
The Avorms thy covering, and thy couch the earth. 
How art thou fall'n from thine ethereal height. 
Son of the morning ! sunk in endless night : 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



How art thou fall'n, who said'st in pride of soul, 
I will ascend above the starry pole, 
Thence rule the adoring nations with my nod, 
And set my throne above the Mount of God ! 
Spilt in the dust, thy blood pollutes the ground ; 
Sought by the eyes that fear'd thee, yet not found ; 
Thy chieftains pause, they turn thy relics o'er. 
Then pass thee by, — for thou art known no more. 
Hail to thine advent ! Potentate, in hell, 
Unfear'd, unflatter'd, undistinguish'd dwell ; 
On earth thy fierce ambition knew no rest, 
A worm, a flame, for ever in thy breast ; 
Here feel the rage of unconsuming fire. 
Intense, eternal, impotent desire ; 
Here lie, the deathless worm's unwasting pre)-, 
In chains of darkness till the judgment-day.' 

" Thus while the dead thy fearful welcome sing. 
Thy living slaves bewail their vanish'd king. 
Then, though thy reign M'ith infamy expire, 
Fulfill'd in death shall be thy vain desire ; 
The traitors, reeking with thy blood, shall swear. 
They saw their sovereign ravish'd through the air. 
And point thy star revolving o'er the night, 
A baleful comet with portentous light, 
Midst clouds and storms denouncing from afar 
Famine, and havoc, pestilence and war. 
Temples, not tombs, thy monuments shall be. 
And altars blaze on hills and groves to thee ; 
A pyramid shall consecrate thy crimes. 
Thy name and honours to succeeding times ; 
There shall thine image hold the highest place 
Among the gods of man's revolted race ! 

" That race shall perish : — Men and Giants, all 
Thy kindred and thy worshippers shall fall. 
The babe, whose Hfe with yesterday began. 
May spring to youth, and ripen into man ; 
But ere his locks are tinged with fading gray. 
This world of sinners shall be swept aAvay. 



Jehovah Hfts his standard to the skies, 

Swift at the signal winds and vapours rise ; 

The sun in sackcloth veils his face at noon, — 

The stars are quench'd, and turn'd to blood the moon. 

Heaven's fountains open, clouds dissolving roll 

In mingling cataracts from pole to pole. 

Earth's central sluices burst, the hills uptorn, 

In rapid whirlpools down the gulf are borne : 

The voice that taught the Deep his bounds to know, 

' Thus far, O Sea ! nor farther shalt thou go,' — 

Sends forth the floods commission'd to devour 

With boundless license, and resistless power ; 

They own no impulse but the tempest's sway, 

Nor find a limit but the light of day. 

" The vision opens : — sunk beneath the Avave, 
The guilty share an universal grave ; 
One wilderness of water rolls in view, 
And heaven and ocean wear one turbid hue ; 
Still stream unbroken torrents from the skies, 
Higher beneath the inundations rise ; 
A lurid twilight glares athwart the scene, 
Low thunders peal, faint lightnings flash between. 
— Methinks I see a distant vessel ride, 
A lonely object on the shoreless tide ; 
Within whose ark the innocent have found 
Safety, while stay'd Destruction ravens round ; 
Thus, in the hour of vengeance, God, who knows 
His servants, spares them, while He smites his foes. 

" Eastward I turn ; — o'er all the deluged lands. 
Unshaken yet, a mighty mountain stands, 
Where Seth, of old, his flock to pasture led. 
And watch'd the stars at midnight from its head : 
An island now, its dark, majestic form 
Scowls through the thickest ravage of the storm ; 
While on its top, the monument of fame. 
Built by thy murderers to adorn thy name, 
Defies the shock ; — a thousand cubits high, 
The sloping pyramid ascends the sky. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



Thither, their latest refuge in distress, 
Like hunted wolves, the rallying Giants press ; 
Round the broad base of that stupendous tower 
The shuddering fugitives collect their power, 
Chng to the dizzy cliff, o'er ocean bend, 
And howl with terror as the deeps ascend. 
The mountain's strong foundations still endure, 
The heights repel the surge. — Awhile secure, 
And cheer'd with frantic hope, thy votaries climb 
The fabric, rising step by step, sublime. 
Beyond the clouds they see the summit glow 
In heaven's pure daylight, o'er the gloom below; 
There too thy worshipp'd image shines like fire, 
In the full glory of thy fabled sire. 
They hail the omen, and with heart and voice 
Call on thy name, and in thy smile rejoice : 
False omen ! on thy name in vain they call ; 
Fools in their joy ; — a moment and they fall. 
Rent by an earthquake of the buried plain. 
And shaken by the whole disrupted main. 
The mountain trembles on its failing base. 
It slides, it stoops, it rushes from its place ; 
From all the Giants bursts one drowning cry ; 
Hark ! 'tis thy name,-r-they curse it as they die ; 
Sheer to the lowest gulf the pile is hurl'd. 
The last sad wreck of a devoted world. 

" So fall transgressors : — Tyrant ! now fulfil 
Thy secret purposes, thine utmost will ; 
Here crown thy triumphs : — life or death decree. 
The weakest here disdains thy power and thee." 

Thus when the Patriarch ceased, and every ear 
Still listen'd in suspense of hope and fear. 
Sublime, ineffable, angelic grace 
Beam'd in his meek and venerable face ; 
And sudden glory, streaming round his head, 
O'er all his robes with lambient lustre spread ; 
His earthly features grew divinely bright, 
His essence seem'd transforming into hght. 



Brief silence, like the pause between the flash 

At midnight, and the following tlumder-crash, 

Ensued : — Anon, with universal cry, 

The Giants rush'd upon the Prophet, — " Die !" 

The king leapt foremost from his throne ; — he drew 

His battle-sword, as on his mark he flew ; 

With aim unerring, and tempestuous sound, 

The blade descended deep along the ground : 

The foe was fled, and, self-o'erwhelm'd, his strength 

Hurl'd to the earth his Atlantean length ; 

But ere his chiefs could stretch the helping arm. 

He sprang upon his feet in pale alarm ; 

Headlong and blind with rage he search'd around, 

But Enoch luaWd with God, and was not found. 

Yet where the captives stood, in holy awe, 
Rapt on the wings of cherubim, they saw 
Their sainted sire ascending through the night ; 
He turn'd his face to bless them in his flight, 
Then vanish'd : — Javan caught the Prophet's eye, 
And snatch'd his mantle falling from the sky ; 
O'er him the Spirit of the Prophet came, 
Like rushing wind awakening hidden ilame : 
" Where is the God of Enoch now ?" he cried,* 
" Captives, come forth ! Despisers, shrink aside." 
He spake, and bursting through the Giant-throng, 
Smote with the mantle as he moved along : 
A power invisible their rage controll'd, 
Hither and thither as he turn'd they roll'd ; 
Unawed, unharm'd, the ransom'd prisoners pass'd. 
Through ranks of foes astonied and aghast : 
Close in the youth's conducting steps they trod : 
— So Israel march'd when Moses raised his rod. 
And led their host, enfranchised, through the wave, 
The people's safeguard, the pursuers' grave. 

Thus from the wolves this little flock was torn, 
And sheltering in the mountain-caves till morn, 



They join'd to sing, in strains of full delight, 
Songs of dehverance through the dreary night. 

The Giants' frenzy, when they lost their prey, 
No tongue of man or angel might portray ; 
First on their idol-gods their vengeance turn'd. 
Those gods on their own altar-piles they burn'd ; 
Then, at their sovereign's mandate, sallied forth 
To rouse their host to combat, from the north ; 
Eager to risk their uttermost emprise, 
Perish ere morn, or reign in Paradise. 
Now the slow tempest, that so long had lower'd. 
Keen in their faces sleet and hailstones shower'd ; 
The winds bleAv loud, the waters roar'd around. 
An earthquake rock'd the agonizing ground ; 
Red in the west the burning mount, array'd 
With tenfold terror by incumbent shade, 
(For moon and stars were wrapt in dunnest gloom,) 
Glared like a torch amidst creation's tomb : 
So Sinai's rocks were kindled when they felt 
Their Maker's footstep, and began to melt ; 
Darkness was his pavihon, whence He came, 
Hid in the brightness of descending flame. 
While storm, and whirlwind, and the trumpet's blast, 
Proclaim'd his law in thunder, as He pass'd. 

The Giants reach'd their camp : — the night's alarms 
Meanwhile had startled all their slaves to arms : 
They grasp'd their weapons as from sleep they sprang. 
From tent to tent the brazen clangor rang : 
The hail, the earthquake, the mysterious hght 
Unnerved their strength, o'erwhelm'd them with affright. 
" Warriors ! to battle ; — summon all your powers ; 
Warriors ! to conquest ; — Paradise is ours," 
Exclaim'd their monarch ; — not an arm was raised, 
In vacancy of thought, like men amazed. 
And lost amidst confounding dreams, they stood. 
With palsied eyes, and horror-frozen blood. 
The Giants' rage to instant madness grew ; 
The king and chiefs on their own legions flew, 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOB. 



Denouncing- vengeance ; — then had all the plain 

Been heap'd with myriads by their leaders slain ; 

But ere a sword could fall, — by whirlwinds driven, 

In mighty volumes, through* the vault of heaven. 

From Eden's summit, o'er the camp accurst, 

The darting fires with noon-day splendour burst ; 

And fearful grew the scene above, below 

With sights of mystery, and sounds of woe. 

The embattled cherubim appear'd on high. 

And coursers, wing'd with lightning, swept the sky ; 

Chariots, whose wheels with living instinct roU'd, 

Spirits of unimaginable mould. 

Powers, such as dwell in heaven's serenest light. 

Too pure, too terrible for mortal sight. 

From depth of midnight suddenly reveal'd. 

In arms, against the Giants took the field. 

On such an host Elisha's servant gazed, 

When all the mountain round the prophet blazed ;* 

With such an host, when war in heaven was wrought, 

Michael against the Prince of Darkness fought. 

Roused by the trumpet that shall wake the dead, 
The torpid foe in consternation fled ; 
The Giants headlong in the uproar ran. 
The king himself the foremost of the van, 
Nor e'er his rushing squadrons led to fight 
With swifter onset, than he led that flight. 
Homeward the panic-stricken legions flew ; 
Their arms, their vestments, from their limbs they threw ; 
O'er shields and helms the reinless camel strode. 
And gold and purple strew'd the desert road. 
When through the Assyrian army, like a blast, 
At midnight, the destroying angel pass'd, 
The tyrant that defied the living God, 
Precipitately thus his steps retrod ; 
Even by the way he came, to his own land, 
Return'd, to perish by his offspring's hand.t 




THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 



So fled the Giant-monarch ; — but unknown 

The hand that smote his life ; — he died alone ; 

Amidst the tumult treacherously slain ; 

At morn his chieftains sought their lord in vain, 

Then, reckless of the harvest of their toils, 

Their camp, their captives, all their treasured spoils, 

Renew'd their flight o'er eastern hills afar, 

With life alone escaping from that Avar, 

In which their king had hail'd his realm complete. 

The world's last province bow'd beneath his feet. 

As, when the waters of the Flood declined. 
Rolling tumultuously before the wind. 
The proud waves shrunk from low to lower beds. 
And high the hills and higher raised their heads, 
Till ocean laj^, enchased with rock and strand, 
As in the hollow of the Almighty's hand, 
While earth with wrecks magnificent was strcAv'd, 
And stillness reign'd o'er jNTature's solitude. 
— Thus in a storm of horror and dismaj^ 
All night the Giant-army sped away ; 
Thus on a lonely, sad, and silent scene. 
The morning rose in majesty serene. 

Early and joyful o'er the dewy grass, 
Straight to their glen the ransom'd Patriarchs pass : 
As doves released their parent dweUing find. 
They fly for life, nor cast a look behind ; 
And Avhen they reach'd the dear sequester'd spot, 
Enoch alone of all their train " was not." 
With them the bard, who from the world withdrew, 
Javan, from folly and ambition flew ; 
Though poor his lot, within that narroAV bound. 
Friendship, and home, and faithful love he found : 
There did his wanderings and aflhctions cease. 
His youth was penitence, his age was peace. 
Meanwhile the scatter'd tribes of Eden's plain 
Turn'd to their desolated fields again, 
And join'd their brethren, captives once in fight, 
But left to freedom in that dreadful flight : 




Thenceforth redeem'd from war's unnumber'd woes, 

Rich Avith the spoils of their retreated foes, 

By Giant-tyranny no more opprest, 

The people flourish'd, and the land had rest. 




GREENLAND. 



A POEM, IN FIVE CANTOS. 



PREFACE. 

In thf! following Poem rhe Author frankly acknowledges that he has so far 
failed, as to be nnder the necessity of sending it forth incomplete, or suppressing 
it altogether. Why he has not done the latter is of little importance to the pub- 
lic, which will assuredly award him no more credit than his performance, taken 
as it is, can command; while the consequences of his temerity, or his misfor- 
tune, must remain wholly with himself. 

The original plan was intended to embrace the most prominent events in the 
annals of ancient and modern Greenland ;— incidental descriptions of whatever 
is sublime or picturesque in the seasons and scenery, or peculiar in the super:^ti- 
tions, manners, and character of the natives,— with a rapid retrospect of that 
moral revolution which the Gospel has wrought among these people by reclaim- 
ing them, almost universally, from dark idolatry and savage ignorance. 

Of that part of the projected poem which is here exhibited, the first three can- 
tos contain a sketch of the history of the ancient Moravian Church, its revival 
in the early part of the eighteenth century, the origin of the missions by that 
people to Greenland, and the voyage of the first three brethren who went thither 
in 1733. The fourth canto refers principally to traditions concerning the Nor- 
wegian colonies, which are said to have existed, on both shores of Greenland, 
from the tenth century to the fifteenth. In the fifth canto the author has at- 
tempted, in a series of episodes, to sum up and exemplify the chief causes of the 
extinction of those colonies, and the abandonment of Greenland for several cen- 
turies by European voyagers. Although this canto is entirely a work of imagi- 
nation, the fiction has not been adopted merely as a substitute for lost facts, b\it 
as a vehicle fir illustrating some of the most splendid and striking phenomena 
of the climate, for which a more appropriate place might not have been found, 
even if the poem had been carried to a successful conclusion. 

The principal subjects introduced in the course of the poem will be found in 
Crantz's histories of the Brethren and of Greenland, or in Risler's Narratives, 
extracted from the records of the ancient Unitas Fratrum, or United Brethren. 
To the accounts of Iceland, by various travellers, the author is also much in- 
debted. 

Sheffield, March ^,]8\9. 



2M 



GREENLAND. 



CANTO FIRST. 

The first three Moravian Missionaries are represented as on their Voyage to 
Greenland, in the Year 1733— Sketch of the Descent, Establishment, Persecu- 
tions, Extinction, and Revival cf the Church of the United Brethren from the 
tenth to the beginning- of the eighteenth Century — The Origin of their Missions 
to the West Indies and to Chreenlund. ' 

The moon is watching in the sky; the stars 

Are swiftly AvheeUng- on their golden cars ; 

Ocean out-tretcht with infinite expanse, 

Serenely slumbers in a glorious trance ; 

The tide o'er which no troubling spirits breathe, 

Reflects a cloudless firmament beneath ; 

"Where, poised as in the centre of a sphere, 

A ship above and ship below appear ; 

A double image, pictured on the deep. 

The vessel o'er its shadow seems to sleep ; 

Yet, like the host of heaven, that never rest, 

With evanescent motion to the west, 

The pageant glides through loneliness and night, 

And leaves behind a rippling wake of light. 

Hark ! through the calm and silence of the scene. 
Slow, solemn, sweet, v.'ith many a pause between, 
Celestial music swells along the air ! 
— No ! — 'tis the evening hymn of praise and prayer 
From yonder deck ; where, on the stern retired. 
Three humble voyagers, with looks inspired. 
And hearts enkindled with a holier flame 
Than ever lit to empire or to fame. 
Devoutly stand : — their choral accents rise 
On wings of harmony beyond the skies ; 
And midst the songs, that Seraph-Minstrels sing, 
Day without night, to their immortal King, 

OL. I. IS 205 



These simple strains, — which erst Bohemian hills 

Echo'd to pathless woods and desert rills ; 

Now heard from Shetland's azure bound, — are known 

In heaven ; and He, who sits upon the throne 

In human form, with mediatorial power, 

Remembers Calvary, and hails the hour, 

When, by the Almighty Father's high decree, 

The utmost north to Him shall bow the knee. 

And, won by love, an untamed rebel-race 

Kiss the victorious Sceptre of his grace. 

Then to His eye, whose instant glance pervades 

Heaven's heights. Earth's circle. Hell's profoundest shades, 

Is there a group more lovely than those three 

Night-watching Pilgrims on the lonely sea ? 

Or to His ear, that gathers in one sound 

The voices of adoring worlds around. 

Comes there a breath of more delightful praise 

Than the faint notes his poor disciples raise. 

Ere on the treacherous main they sink to rest. 

Secure as leaning on their Master's breast ? 

They sleep : but memory wakes ; and dreams array 
Night in a Uvely masquerade of day ; 
The land they seek, the land they leave behind, 
Meet on mid-ocean in the plastic mind : 
One brings forsaken home and friends so nigh. 
That tears in slumber swell th' unconscious eye ; 
The other opens, with prophetic view. 
Perils, which e'en their fathers never knew, 
(Though school'd by suffering, long inured to toil, 
Outcasts and exiles from their natal soil ;) 

Strange scenes, strange men ; untold, untried distress ; 

Pain, hardships, famine, cold, and nakedness. 
Diseases ; death in every hideous form. 
On shore, at sea, by fire, by flood, by storm ; 
Wild beasts and wilder men ; — unmoved with fear, 
Health, comfort, safety, life, they count not dear, 
May they but hope a Saviour's love to show, 
And warn one spirit from eternal wo ; 



GREENLAND. 



Nor will they faint ; nor can they strive in vain, 

Since thus — to live is Christ, to die is gain. 

'Tis morn : — the bathing moon her lustre shrouds ; 

Wide o'er the East impends an arch of clouds, 

That spans the ocean ; — while the infant dawn 

Peeps through the portal o'er the liquid lawn, 

That ruffled by an April gale appears, 

Between the gloom and splendour of the spheres, 

Dark-purple as the moorland-heath, Avhen rain 

Hangs in low vapours o'er the autumnal plain : 

Till the full Sun, resurgent from the flood. 

Looks on the waves, and turns them into blood ; . 

But quickly kindhng, as his beams aspire, 

The lambent billows play in forms of fire. 

— Where is the Vessel ? — Shining through the light. 

Like the white sea-fowl's horizontal flight. 

Yonder she wings, and skims, and cleaves her way 

Through refluent foam and iridescent spray. 
Lo ! on the deck, with patriarchal grace. 

Heaven in his bosom opening o'er his face, 

Stands Christian David ; — venerable name ! 

Bright in the records of celestial fame. 

On earth obscure ; — like some sequester'd star, 

That rolls in its Creator's beams afar, 

Unseen by man ; till telescopic 3ye, v^ 

Sounding the blue abysses of thi3 sky, 

DraAvs forth its hidden beauty into light, 

And adds a jewel to the crown of night. 

Though hoary with the multitude of years, 

Unshorn of strength, between his young compeers, 

He towers ; — with faith, whose boundless glance can see 

Time's shadows brightening through eternity ; 

Love, — God's own love in his pure breast enshrined ; 

Love, — love to man the magnet of his mind ; 

Sublimer schemes maturing in his thought 

Than ever statesman plann'd or warrior wrought ; 

While with rejoicing tears, and rapturous sighs, 

To heaven ascends their mornino; sacrifice. 



GREENLAND. 



Whence are the pilgrims ? whither would they roam ? 
Greenland their port ; — Moravia was their home. 
Sprung from a race of martyrs ; men who bore 
The cross on many a Golgotha, of yore ; 
When first Sclavonian tribes the truth received, 
And princes at the price of thrones believed ; 
— When Waldo, flying from th' apostate west, 
In German wilds his righteous cause confess'd ; 
— When WicKLiFi'E, like a rescuing Angel, found 
The dungeon where the word of God lay bound. 
Unloosed its chains, and led it bj'^ the hand, 
In its own sunshine, through his native laad : 
— When Huss, the victim of perfidious foes, 
To heaven upon a fiery chariot rose ; 
And ere he vanish'd, with a prophet's breath, 
Foretold th' immortal triumphs of his death : 
— When ZisKA, burning with fanatic zeal. 
Exchanged the Spirit's sword for patriot steel, 
And through the heart of Austria's thick array 
To Tabor's summit stabb'd resistless waj' ; 
But there (as if transfigured on the spot 
The world's Redeemer stood) his rage forgot ; 
Deposed his arms and trophies in the dust, 
Wept hke a babe, and placed in Giod his trust. 
While prostrate warriors kiss'd the hallow'd ground, 
And lay, like slain, in silent ranks around : 
— When mild Gregorius, in a lowher field, 
As brave a witness, as unwont to yield 
As Ziska's self, with patient footsteps trod 
A path of suffering, like the Son of God, 
And nobler palms, by meek endurance won, 
Than if his sword had blazed from sun to sun : 
Though nature fafl'd him on the racking wheel, 
He felt the joys which parted spirits feel ; 
Rapt into bliss from ecstasy of pain. 
Imagination wander'd o'er a plain : 
Fair in the midst, beneath a morning sky, 
A tree its ample branches bore on high, 



With fragrant bloom, and fruit delicious hung, 

While birds beneath the foliage fed and sung ; 

All glittering to the sun ^vith diamond dew, 

O'er sheep and kine a breezy shade it threw ; 

A lovely boy, the child of hope and prayer. 

With crook and shepherd's pipe, Avas watching there ; 

At hand three venerable forms were seen, 

In simple garb, with apostolic mien, 

"Who mark'd the distant fields convulsed with strife, 

— The guardian Cherubs of that Tree of Life ; 

Not armed like Eden's host, with flaming brands, 

Alike to friends and foes they stretch their hands, 

In sign of peace, and while Destruction spread 

His path with carnage, welcomed ^1 who fled : 

— When poor Comenius, with his little flock, 

Escaped the wolves, and from the boundary rock 

Cast o'er Moravian hills a look of wo. 

Saw the green vales expand, the waters flow. 

And happier years revolving in his mind. 

Caught every sound that murmur'd on the wind ; 

As if his eye could never thence depart. 

As if his ear were seated in his heart, 

And his full soul would thence a passage break. 

To leave the body, for his country's sake ; 

While on his knees he pour'd the fervent prayer, 

That God would make that martyr-land his care, 

And nourish in its ravaged soil a root 

Of Gregor's Tree, to bear perennial fruit. ^ 

His prayer was heard: — that Church, through ages past, 
Assail'd and rent by persecution's blast ; 
Whose sons no yoke could crush, no burden tire, 
Unawed by dungeons, tortures, sword, and fire, 
(Less proof against the world's alluring wiles, 
"Whose frowns have Aveaker terrors than its smiles ;) 
— That Church o'erthrown, dispersed, unpeopled, dead, 
Oft from the dust of ruin raised her head. 
And rallying round her feet, as from their graves. 
Her exiled orphans, hid in forest-caves ; 




Where, midst the fastnesses of rocks and glens, 

Banded Hke robbers, stealing from their dens. 

By night they met, their holiest vows to pay. 

As if their deeds were dark, and shunn'd the day ; 

While Christ's revilers, in his seamless robe, 

And parted garments, flaunted round the globe ; 

From east to west Avhile priestcraft's banners flew. 

And harness'd kings his iron chariot drew : 

— That Church advanced triumphant, o'er the ground. 

Where all her conquering martyrs had been crown'd, 

Fearless her foe's whole malice to defy, 

And worship God in liberty, — or die : 

For truth and conscience oft she pour'd her blood, 

And firmest in the fierc*est conflicts stood. 

Wresting from bigotry the proud control 

Claim'd o'er the sacred empire of the soul. 

Where God, the judge of all, should fill the throne. 

And reign, as in his universe, alone. 

'Twas thus throu2;h centuries she rose and fell; 
At length victorious seem'd the gates of hell ; 
But founded on a rock, Avhich cannot move — 
Th' eternal rock of her Redeemer's love — 
That Church, Avhich Satan's legions thought destroy'd, 
Her name extinct, her place for ever void. 
Alive once more, respired her native air, 
But found no freedom for the voice of prayer : 
Again the cowl'd oppressor clank'd his chains, 
Flourish'd his scourge, and threaten'd bonds and pains 
(His arm enfeebled could no longer kill. 
But in his heart he was a murderer still :) 
Then Christian David, strengthen'd from above, 
Wise as the serpent, harmless as the dove ; 
Bold as a lion on his Master's part. 
In zeal a serai)h, and a child in heart : 
Pluck'd from the gripe of antiquated laws, 
( — Even as a mother from the felon jaws 
Of a lean wolf, that bears her babe away. 
With courage beyond nature, rends the prey,) 



GREENLAND. 



The little remnant of that ancient race : 

— Far in Lusatian woods they found a place ; 

There — where the sparrow builds her busy nest, 

And the clime-changing swallow loves to rest, 

Thine altar, C4od of Hosts ! — there still appear 

The tribes to Avorship, unassail'd by fear ; 

Not like their fathers, vex'd from age to age 

By blatant Bigotry's insensate rage. 

Abroad in every place, — in every hour 

Awake, alert, and ramping to devour. 

No ; peaceful as the spot where Jacob slept. 

And guard all night the journeying angels kept, 

Herrnhut yet stands amidst her shelter'd bowers ; 

— The Lord hath set his watch upon her towers. 

Soon, homes of humblq form, and structure rude. 
Raised sweet society in solitude : 
And the lorn traveller there, at fall of night. 
Could trace from distant hills the spangled light, 
Which now from many a cottagj Avindow stream'd, 
Or in full glory round the chapel beam'd ; 
While hymning voices, in the silent shade. 
Music of all his soul's affections made ; 
Where through the trackless wilderness erewhile. 
No hospitable ray Avas known to smile ; 
Or if a sudden splendour kindled joy, 
'TAA^as but a meteor dazzling to destroy : 
While the wood echoed to the hollow oavI, 
The fox's cry, or Avolf's lugubrious howl. 

UnAvearied as the camel, day by day. 
Tracks through unAA-ater'd Avilds his doleful way, 
Yet in his breast a cherish'd draught retains. 
To cool the fervid current in his veins. 
While from the sun's meridian realms he brings 
The gold and gems of Ethiopian kings : 
So Christian David, spending yet unspent, 
On many a pilgrimage of mercy Avent ; 
Through all their haunts his suffering brethren sought. 
And safely to that land of promise brought ; 



GREENLAND. 



While in his bosom, on the toilsome road, 
A secret well of consolation flow'd, 
Fed from the fountain near th' eternal throne, 
— Bhss to the world unyielded and unknown. 

In stillness thus the little Zion rose ; 
But scarcely found those fugitives repose, 
Ere to the West with pitying eyes they turn'd ; 
Their love to Christ beyond th' Atlantic burn'd. 
Forth sped their messengers, content to be 
Captives themselves, to cheer captivity ; 
Soothe the poor Negro with fraternal smiles. 
And preach deliverance in those prison-isles. 
Where man's most hateful forms of being meet, 
— The tyrant and the slave that licks his feet. 

O'er Greenland next two youths in secret wept ; 
And where the sabbath of the dead was kept, 
With pious forethought, while their hands prepare 
Beds which the living and unborn shall share, 
(For man so surely to the dust is brought, 
His grave before his cradle may be wrought,) 
They told their purpose, each o'erjoy'd to find 
His o-nm idea in his brother's mind. 
For counsel in simplicity thej^ pray'd. 
And vows of ardent consecration made : 
— ^Vows heard in heaven ; from that accepted hour, 
Their souls were clothed with confidence and power, 
Nor hope deferr'd could quell their hearts' desire ; 
The bush once kindled grew amidst the fire ; 
But ere its shoots a tree of life became. 
Congenial spirits caught the electric flame ; 
And for that holy service, young and old, 
Their phghted faith and willing names enroll'd : 
Eager to change the rest, so lately found, 
For life-long labours on barbarian ground ; 
To break, through barriers of eternal ice, 
A vista to the gates of Paradise ; 
And Ught beneath the shadow of the pole 
The tenfold darkness of the human soul ; 



GREENLAND. 



To man, — a task more hopeless than to bless 
With Indian fruits that arctic wilderness ; 
With God, — as possible when unbegun 
As though the destined miracle were done. 

Three chosen candidates at length Avent forth, 
Heralds of mercy to the frozen north ; 
Lilfe mariners with seal'd. instructions sent, 
They went in faith, (as childless Abram went 
To dwell by sufferance in a land, decreed 
The future birthright of his promised seed,) 
Unknowing whither ; — uninquiring Avhy 
Their lot Avas cast beneath so strange a sky. 
Where cloud nor star appear'd, to mortal sense 
Pointing the hidden path of ProA'idence, 
And all around AA^as darkness to be felt ; 
— Yet in that darkness light eternal dAA'elt ; 
They kneAA^, — and 'tAA'as enough for them to knoAV, 
The still small A^oice that Avhisper'd them to go ; 
For He, AA^ho spake by that mysterious voice. 
Inspired their Avail, and made His call their choice. 

See the SAAaft vessel bounding o'er the tide, 
That AA'afts, Avith Christian David for their guide, 
Tavo young Apostles on their joyful Avay 
To regions in the tAAdlight verge of day : 
Freely they quit the clime that gave them birth. 
Home, kindred, friendship, all they loved on earth ; 
What things Avere gain before, accounting loss, 
And glorying in the shame, they bear the cross ; 
— Not as the Spaniard, on his flag unfurl'd, 
A bloody omen through a Pagan Avorld : 
— Not the vain image, Avhich the DeA'otee 
Clasps as the God of his idolatry ; 
But in their hearts, to Greenland's Avestern shore, 
That dear memorial of their Lord they bore ; 
Amidst the Avilderness to lift the sign 
Of Avrath appeased by sacrifice divine ; 
And bid a serpent-stung and dying race 
Look on their Healer, and be saved bj" grace. 



GREENLAND. 



CANTO SKCONI). 

Hopes and Fears— The Brethren pursue their Voyage— A Digression on Iceland. 

What are thine hopes, Humanity I — thy fears ? 
Poor voyager, upon this flood of years, 
AVhose tide, unturning, hurri(3s to the sea 
Of dark, unsearchable eternity. 
The fragile skiffs, in which thy children sail 
A day, an hour, a moment, with the gale. 
Then vanish ; — gone like eagles on the wind, 
Or fish in waves, that yield and close behind ? 
Thine Hopes, — lost anchors buried in the deep, 
That rust, through storm and calm, in iron sleep ; 
Whose cables, loose aloft and fix'd below, 
Rot with the sea-weed, floating to and fro ! 
Thy Fears, — are Avrecks that strew the fatal surge, 
Whose whirlpools swallow, or whose currents urge. 
Adventurous barks on rocks, that lurk at rest. 
Where the blue halcyon builds her foam-light nest ; 
Or strand them on illumined shoals, that gleam 
Like drifted gold in summer's cloudless beam : 
Thus would thy race, beneath their parent's eye. 
Live without knowledge, without prospect die. 

But when Religion bids her spirit breathe, 
And opens bliss above and wo beneath ; 
When God reveals his march through Nature's night 
His steps are beauty, and his presence light. 
His voice is hfe : — the dead in conscience start ; 
They feel a new creation in the heart. 
Ah ! then Humanity, thy hopes, thy fears. 
How changed, how wondrous ! — On this tide of years. 
Though the frail barks, in which thine offspring sail 
Their day, their hour, their moment with the gale, 
Must perish ; — Shipwreck only sets them free ; 
With joys unmeasured as eternity, 
They ply on seas of glass their golden oars. 
And pluck immortal fruits along the shores ; 



GREENLAND. 21i 

Nor shall their cables fail, their anchors rust, 
Who wait the resurrection of the just : 
Moor'd on the Rock of Ages, though decay- 
Moulder the weak terrestrial frame away, 
The trumpet sounds, — and lo ! wherever spread. 
Earth, air, and ocean render back their dead ; 
And souls with bodies, spiritual, and divine. 
In the new heavens, like stars, for ever shine. 
These are thine Hopes : — thy Fears what tongue can tell ? 
Behold them graven on the gates of Hell : 
" The wrath of God abideth here : his breath 
Kindled the flames : — this is the second death." 
'Twas Mercy wrote the lines of judgment there ; 
Xone who from earth can read them may despair ! 
]Man ! — let the warning strike presumption dumb ; — 
Awake, arise, escape the wrath to come ; 
No resurrection from that grave shall be ; 
The worm within is — immortality. 

The terrors of Jehovah, and his grace. 
The Brethren bear to earth's remotest race. 
.4nd now, exulting on their swift career. 
The northern waters narrowing in the rear. 
They rise upon th' Atlantic flood, that rolls 
Shoreless and fathomless between the poles. 
Whose Avaves the east and western Avorld divide. 
Then gird the globe with one circumfluent tide ; 
For mighty Ocean, by whatever name 
Known to vain man, is everywhere the same, 
And deems all regions by his gulfs embraced 
But vassal tenures of his sovereign waste. 
Clear shines the sun ; the surge, intensely blue, 
Assumes by day heaven's own aerial hue : 
Buoyant and beautiful, as through a sky, 
On balanced wings, behold the vessel fly ! 
Invisibly impell'd, as though it felt 
A soul, within its heart of oak that dwelt. 
Which broke the billows with spontaneous force, 
Ruled the free elements, and chose its course. 



GREENLAND. 



Not so : — and yet along the trackless realm, 
A hand unseen directs th' unconscious helm ; 
The Power that sojourn'd in the cloud by day, 
And fire by night, on Israel's desert way ; 
That PoAver the obedient vessel owns : — His will, 
Tempest and calm, and death and life, fulfil. 

Day following day the current smoothly flows ; 
Labour is but refreshment from repose ; 
Perils are vanish'd ; every fear resign'd ; 
Peace walks the waves, Hope carols on the Avind ; 
And time so sweetly travels o'er the deep. 
They feel his motion hke the fall of sleep 
On weary limbs, that, stretch'd in stillness, seem 
To float upon the eddy of a stream. 
Then sink, — to wake in some transporting dream. 
Thus, while the Brethren far in exile roam. 
Visions of Greenland show their future home. 
— Now a dark speck, but brightening as it flies, 
A vagrant sea-fowl glads their eager eyes ; 
How lovely, from the narrow deck to see 
The meanest hnk of nature's family. 
Which makes us feel, in dreariest solitude, 
Affinity with all that breathe renew'a : 
At once a thousand kind emotions start. 
And the blood warms and mantles round the heart ! 
— O'er the ship's lee, the waves in shadow seen. 
Change from deep indigo to beryl green, 
And wreaths of frequent weed, that slowly float. 
Land to the watchful mariner denote : 
Ere long the pulse beats quicker through his breast, 
When, like a range of evening clouds at rest, 
Iceland's gray cliffs and ragged coast he sees. 
But shuns them, leaning on the southern breeze ; 
And while they vanish far in distance, tells 
Of lakes of fire and necromancers' spells. 

Strange Isle ! a moment to poetic gaze 
Rise in thy majesty of rocks and bays. 



GREENLAND. 



Glens, fountains, caves, that seem not things of earth, 

But the wild shapes of some prodigious birth ; 

As if the kraken, monarch of the sea, 

Wallowing abroad in his immensity, 

By polar storms and lightning shafts assail'd, 

Wedged with ice-mountains, here had fought and fail'd 

Perish'd — and in the petrifying blast, 

His hulk became an island rooted fast ! 

— Rather, from ocean's dark foundation hurl'd. 

Thou art a type of his mysterious world, 

Buoy'd on the desolate abyss, to show 

What wonders of creation hide below. 

Here Hecla's triple peaks, with meteor lights, 
Nature's own beacons, cheer hybernal nights : 
But when the orient flames in red array, 
Like ghosts the spectral splendours flee the day; 
Morn at her feet beholds supinely spread 
The carcass of the old chimera dead. 
That wont to vomit flames and molten ore, 
Now cleft asunder to the inmost core ; 
In smouldering heaps, wide wrecks and cinders strown, 
Lie like the walls of Sodom overthrown, 
(Ere from the face of blushing Nature swept, 
And where the city stood the Dead Sea slept ;) 
While inaccessible, tradition feigns, 
To human foot the guarded top remains. 
Where birds of hideous shape and doleful note. 
Fate's ministers, in livid vapours float. 

Far ofl", amid the placid sunshine, glow 
Mountains with hearts of fire and crests of snow. 
Whose blacken'd slopes with deep ravines entrench'd. 
Their thunders silenced, and their hghtnings quench'd, 
Still the slow heat of spent eruptions breathe. 
While embryo earthquakes swell their wombs beneath. 

Hark ! from yon caldron cave, the battle sound 
Of fire and water warring under ground ; 
Rack'd on the wheels of an ebullient tide. 
Here might some spirit, fallen from bliss, abide. 



GREENLAND. 



Such fitful wailings of intense despair, 

Such emanating- splendours fill the air. 

— He comes, he comes ; the infuriate Geyser springs 

Up to the firmament on vapoury wings ; 

With breathless awe the mounting glory view ; 

White, whirling clouds his steep ascent pursue. 

But lo ! a glimpse ; — refulgent to the gale, 

He starts all naked through his riven veil ; 

A fountain-column, terrible and bright, 

A living, breathing, moving form of light ; 

From central earth to heaven's meridian thrown. 

The mighty apparition towers alone. 

Rising, as though for ever he could rise, 

Storm and resume his palace in the skies. 

All foam, and turbulence, and wrath below ; 

Around him beams the reconciling bow ; 

(Signal of peace, whose radiant girdle binds. 

Till nature's doom, the waters and the winds ;) 

While mist and spray, condensed to sudden dews, 

The air illumine with celestial hues, 

As if the bounteous sun were raining down 

The richest gems of his imperial crown. 

In vain the spirit Avrestlcs to break free, 

Foot-bound to fathomless captivity ; 

A power unseen, by sympathetic spell 

For ever Avorking, — to his flinty cell, 

Recalls him from the ramparts of the spheres ; 

He yields, collapses, lessens, disappears ; 

Darkness receives him in her vague abyss. 

Around whose verge light froth and bubbles hiss, 

While the low murmurs of the refluent tide 

Far into subterranean silence glide. 

The eye still gazing down the dread profound, 

When the bent ear hath wholly lost the sound. 

— But is he slain or sepulchred ? — Again 

The deathless giant sallies from his den. 

Scales with recruited strength the ethereal waUs, 

Struggles afresh for liberty — and falls. 



GREENLAND. 319 



Yes, and for liberty the fight renew'd, 
By day, by night, undaunted, unsubdued, 
He shall maintain, till Iceland's solid base 
Fail, and the mountains vanish from its face. 

And can these fail ? — Of Alpine height and mould 
Schapta's unshaken battlements behold ; 
His throne an hundred hills ; his sun-crown'd head 
Resting on clouds ; his robe of shadow spread 
O'er half the isle ; he pours from either hand 
An unexhausted river through the land. 
On whose fair banks, through valleys warm and green, 
Cattle and flocks, and homes, and spires are seen. 
Here Nature's earthquake pangs were never felt ; 
Here in repose hath man for ages dwelt ; 
The everlasting mountain seems to say, 
" I am, — and I shall never pass away." 

Yet fifty winters, and with huge uproar. 
Thy pride shall perish ; — thou shalt be no more ; 
Amidst chaotic ruins on the plain, 
Those cliffs, these waters shall be sought in vain ! 
— Through the dim vista of unfolding years, 
A pageant of portentous wo appears. 
Yon rosy groups, Avith golden locks at play, 
I see them, — few, decrepit, silent, gray ; 
Their fathers all at rest beneath the sod, 
Whose flowerless verdure marks the House of God, 
Home of the living and the dead ; — where meet 
Kindred and strangers, in communion sweet, 
When dawns the Sabbath on the block-built pile ; 
The kiss of peace, the welcome, and the smile 
Go round ; till comes the Priest, a father there. 
And the bell knolls his family to prayer ; 
Angels might stoop from thrones in heaven, to be 
Co-worshippers in such a family. 

Whom from their nooks and dells, where'er they roam, 
The Sabbath gathers to their common home. 
Oh ! I would stand a keeper at this gate 
Rather than reign with kings in guilty state ; 



GREENLAND. 



A day in such serene enjoyment spent 
Were worth an age of splendid discontent ! 
— But whither am I hurried from my theme ? 
Schapta returns on the prophetic dream. 

From eve till morn strange meteors streak the pole ; 
At cloudless noon mysterious thunders roll, 
As if below both shore and ocean hurl'd 
From deep convulsions of the nether world ; 
Anon the river, boiling from its bed, 
Shall leap its bounds and o'er the lowlands spread, 
Then waste in exhalation, — leaving void 
As its own channel, utterly destroy'd, 
Fields, gardens, dwehings, churches, and their graves, 
All wreck'd or disappearing with the waves, 
The fugitives that 'scape this instant death 
Inhale slow pestilence with every breath ; 
jVIephitic steams from Schapta's mouldering breast 
With livid horror shall the air infest : 
And day shall glare so foully on the sight, 
Darkness were refuge from the curse of light. 
Lo ! far among the glaciers, Avrapt in gloom, 
The red precursors of approaching doom, 
Scatter'd and solitary founts of fire, 
Unlock'd by hands invisible, aspire ; 
Ere long more rapidly than eye can count. 
Above, beneath, they multiply, they mount, 
Converge, condense, — a crimson phalanx form, 
And range aloft in one unbounded storm ; 
From heaven's red roof the fierce reflections throw 
A sea of fluctuating light below. 
— Now the whole army of destroyers, fleet 
As whirlwinds, terrible as lightnings, meet ; 
The mountains melt like wax along their course. 
When downward, pouring with resistless force, 
Through the void channel where the river roU'd, 
To ocean's verge their flaming march they hold ; 
While blocks of ice, and crags of granite rent. 
Half-fluid ore, and rufrcred minerals blent, 



GREENLAND. 



Float on the gulf, till molten or immersed, 
Or in explosive thunderbolts dispersed, 
Thus shall the Schapta, towering on the brink 
Of unknown jeopardy, in ruin sink ; 
And this wild paroxysm of frenzy past, 
At her own work shall Nature stand aghast. 
Look on this desolation : — mark yon brow, 
Once adamant, a cone of ashes now : 
Here rivers swampt ; there vallej^s levell'd, plains 
O'erwhelm'd ; — one black-red wilderness remains, 
One crust of lava, through whose cinder-heat 
The pulse of buried streams is felt to beat ; 
These from the frequent fissures, eddying white, 
Sublimed to vapour, issue forth like light 
Amidst the sulphury fumes, that, drear and dun. 
Poison the atmosphere and blind the sun. 
Above, as if the sky had felt the stroke 
Of that volcano, and consumed to smoke. 
One cloud appears in heaven, and one alone, 
Hung round the dark horizon's craggy zone, 
Forming at once the vast encircling Avail, 
And the dense roof of some Tartarean hall, 
Propt by a thousand pillars, huge and strange, 
Fantastic forms that every moment change. 
As hissing, surging from the floor beneath. 
Volumes of steam th' imprison'd Avaters breathe. 
Then should the sun, ere eA'ening gloom ascend. 
Quick from the Avest the murky curtain rend, 
And pour the beauty of his beams betAA-een 
These hideous arches, and light up the scene ; 
At the sweet touch of his transforming rays 
With amber lustre all the columns blaze, 
And the thick folds of cumbrous fog aloof 
Change to rich drapery of celestial AA^oof: 
With such enchantment air and earth Avere fraught, 
Beyond the colouring of the Avealthiest thought 
That Iceland Scalds, transported at the vieAV, 
Mioht deem the leg-ends of their fathers true, 



1/ 



And here behold, illumining the waste, 

The palace of immortal Odin placed ; 

Till rapt imagination joy'd to hear 

The neigh of steeds, the clank of armour near. 

And saw, in barbarous state, the tables spread 

With shadowy food, and compass'd with the dead, 

Weary from conflicts, — still the fierce delight 

Of spectre-warriors, in the daily fight : 

Then while they quafF'd the mead from skulls of foes. 

By whirlwind gusts the din of battle rose ; 

The strife of tongues, the tournament of words 

Following the shock of shields, the clash of swords ; 

Till, gorged and drunken at th' enormous feast, ' 

Awhile their revels and their clamours ceased ; 

Ceased to the eye and ear ; — yet where they lay. 

Like sleeping lions, surfeited with prey. 

In tawny groups, recumbent through the den, 

In dreams the heroes drank and fought again. 

Away with such Divinities ! their birth 
Man's brain-sick superstition, and their mirth 
Lust, rapine, cruelty ; — their fell employ 
God's works and their own votaries to destroy. 
— The Runic Bard to nobler themes shall string 
His ancient harp, and mightier triumphs sing : 
For glorious days are risen on Iceland : — clear 
The gospel-trumpet sounds to every ear, 
And deep in many a heart the Spirit's voice 
Bids the believing soul in hope rejoice. 
O'er the stern face of this tempestuous isle. 
Though briefly Spring, and Autumn never, smile. 
Truth walks with naked foot th' unyielding snows, 
And the glad desert blossoms like the rose. 
Though earthquakes heave, though torrents drown his cot, 
Volcanoes waste his fields, — the peasant's lot 
Is blest beyond the destiny of kings : 
— Lifting his eyes above sublunar things, 
Like dying Stephen, when he saw in prayer 
Heaven operl'd, and his Saviour beckoning there. 



GREENLAND. 



He cries, and clasps his Bible to his breast, 
" Let the earth perish, — here is not my rest. 



CANTO THIRD. 



The Voyage to (Greenland concluded— A Fog at Sea — Icefields — Eclipse of the 
Sun— The Oreenland Fable of Malina and .flninga — A Storm — The Ice-blink — 
J^o7-tkern Lights — The Brethren land. 

How speed the faithful witnesses, who bore 

The Bible and its hopes to Greenland's shore ? 

— Like Noah's ark, alone upon the wave 

(Of one lost world the immeasurable grave). 

Yonder the ship, a soHtary speck. 

Comes bounding from the horizon ; while on deck 

Again imagination rests her wing, 

And smooths her pinions, Avhile the Pilgrims sing 

Their vesper oraisons. — The Sun retires. 

Not as he wont, with clear and golden fires ; 

Bewilder'd in a labyrinth of haze. 

His orb redoubled, with discolour'd rays, 

Struggles and vanishes ; — along the deep. 

With slow array, expanding vapours creep, 

Whose folds, in tAvihght's yellow glare uncurl'd, 

Present the dreams of an unreal world ; , 

Islands in air suspended ; marching ghosts 

Of armies, shapes of castles, winding coasts, 

Navies at anchor, mountains, woods, and streams, 

Where all is strange, and nothing what it seems ; 

Till deep involving gloom, without a spark 

Of star, moon, meteor, desolately dark. 

Seals up the vision : — then, the Pilot's fears 

Slacken his arm ; a doubtful course he steers, 

Till morning comes, but comes not clad in light ; 

Uprisen day is but a paler night 

Revealing not a glimpse of sea or sky ; 

The ship's circumference bounds the sailor's eye. 



224 GREEXLAND. 

So cold and dense the inipervioxis fog extends, 

He might have touch'd the point where being ends ; 

His bark is all the universe ; so void 

The scene, — as though creation were destroy'd, 

And he and his few mates, of all their race, 

Were here becalm'd in everlasting space. 

Silent and motionless, above, below. 
The sails all struck, the waves unheard to flow. 
In this drear blank of utter solitude, 
Where hfe stands still, no faithless fears intrude ; 
Through that impervious veil the Brethren see 
The face of omnipresent Deity : 
Nor Him alone ; — whate'er his hand hath made ; 
His glory in the firmament display'd ; 
The sun majestic in his course, and sole ; 
The moon and stars rejoicing round the pole ; 
Earth o'er its peopled realms and wastes unknown, 
Clad in the wealth of every varying zone ; 
Ocean through all the enchantment of his forms. 
From breathing calms to devastating storms ; 
Heaven in the vision of eternal bliss. 
Death's terrors, hell's unsearchable abyss ; 
— Though rapt in secrecy from human eye. 
These in the mind's profound sensorium lie. 
And, with their Maker, by a glance of thought. 
Are in a moment to remembrance brought ; 
Then most, when most restrain'd, th' imperfect sight, 
God and his works shine forth in His own light. 
Yet clearest through that veil the Pilgrims trace 
Their Father's image in their Saviour's face ; 
A sigh can waft them to his feet in prayer, 
Not Gabriel bends with more acceptance there. 
Nor to the throne from heaven's pure altar rise 
The odours of a sweeter sacrifice, 
Than when before the mercj'-seat they kneel. 
And tell Him all they fear, or hope, or feel ; 
Perils Avithout, and enemies within, 
Satan, the world, temptation, Aveakness, sin; 



GREENLAND. 



Yet rest unshaken on his sure defence, 

Invincible through his omnipotence : 

" Oh ! step by step," they cry, " direct our way, 

And give thy grace, hke manna, day by day ; 

The store of yesterday will not suffice, 

To-morrow's sun to us may never rise ; 

Safe only Avhen our souls are stay'd on Thee ; 

Rich only when we know our poverty." 

And step by step the Lord those suppliants led ; 
He gave them daily grace like daily bread ; 
By sea, on shore, through all their pilgrimage. 
In rest and labour, to their latest age, 
Sharp though their trials, and their comforts scant, 
God was their refuge, and they knew not want. 

On rustling pinions, like an unseen bird. 
Among the yards a stirring breeze is heard ; 
The conscious vessel wakes as from a trance. 
Her colours float, the filling sails advance ; 
White from her prow the murmuring surge recedes : 
— So the swan, startled from her nest of reeds. 
Swells into beauty, and with curving chest. 
Cleaves the blue lake, with motion soft as rest. 
Light o'er the liquid lawn the pageant glides ; 
Her helm the well-experienced pilot guides. 
And while he threads the mist-enveloped maze, 
Turns to the magnet his inquiring gaze, 
In whose mute oracle, where'er he steers, 
The pointing hand of Providence appears ; 
With this, though months of gloom the main enrobe, 
His keel might plough a furrow round the globe. 

Again the night ascends without a star : 
Low sounds come booming o'er the waves afar, 
As if conflicting navies shook the flood, 
With human thunders in the strife of blood, 
That slay more victims in one brief campaign, 
Than heaven's own bolt through centuries have slain. 
The seaman hearkens ; — colour flies his cheek, 
His stout heart throbs with fears he dares not speak ; 



GREENLAND. 



No lightning-splendours streak the unbroken gloom ; 
— His bark may shoot the gulf beyond the tomb, 
And he, if e'er it come, may meet a light, 
AVhich never yet hath dawn'd on living sight. 
Fresher and fresher blows the insurgent gale ; 
He reefs his tops, he narroAvs sail by sail, 
Yet feels the ship with swifter impulse sweep 
O'er mightier billows, the recoiling deep ; 
While still, with doleful omen on his ear, 
Come the deaf echoes of those sounds of fear. 
Distant, — yet every volley rolls more near. 



Oh ! in that agony of thought forlorn, 

How longs th' impatient mariner for morn ! 

She wakes, — his eyes are Avither'd to behold 

The scene which her disastrous beams unfold : 

The fog is vanish'd, but the welkin lowers. 

Sharp hail descends, and sleet in blinding showers ; 

Ocean one bed of foam, with fury tost. 

In undistinguishable whiteness lost. 

Save where vast fields of ice their surface show. 

Buoyant, but many a fathom sunk below : 

Changing his station as the fragments pass, 

Death stands the pilot of each ponderous mass ; 

Gathering his brow into the darkest frown, 

He bolts his raft to run the victim down. 

But shoots astern : — the shock the vessel feels, 

A moment in the giddy whirlpool reels. 

Then like an arrow soars, as through the air. 

So high the salient waves their burden bear. 

Gluick skirmishes with floating batteries past. 
Ruin inevitable threats at last : 
Athwart the north, like ships of battle spread, 
Winter's flotilla, by their captain led, 
(Who boasts with these to make his prowess known, 
And plant his foot beyond the arctic zone,) 
Islands of ice, so wedged and grappled lie. 
One moving continent appals the eye, 



And to the ear rene\vs those notes of doom, 

That brought portentous warnings through the gloom 

For loud and louder, with explosive shocks, 

Sudden convulsions spht the frost-bound rocks, 

And launch loose mountains on the frothing ooze, 

As pirate-barks, on summer seas to cruize. 

In front this perilous array ; — behind. 

Borne on the surges, driven by the wind. 

The vessel hurries to the brink of fate ; 

All efforts fail, — but prayer is not too late : 

Then, in the imminent and ghastly fall 

Foul on destruction, — the disciples call 

On Him, their Master, who, in human form, 

Slept in the lap of the devouring storm ; 

On Him, who in the midnight watch was seen, 

Walking the gulf, ineffably serene. 

At whose rebuke the tempest ceased to roar. 

The winds caress'd the waves, the waves the shore. 

On Him they call ;— their prayer, in faith preferr'd, 

Amidst the frantic hurricane is heard ; 

He gives the sign, by none in earth or heaven 

Known, but by him to whom the charge is given. 

The Angel of the Waters ; — he, whose wrath 

Had hurl'd the vessel on that shipwreck path. 

Becomes a minister of grace ; — his breath 

Blows, — and the enemies are scatter'd, — Death, 

Reft of his quarry, plunges through the wave. 

Buried himself Avhere he had mark'd their grave. 

The line of battle broken, and the chain 

Of that armada, which oppress'd the main, 

Snapt hopelessly asunder, quickly all 

The enormous masses in disruption fall, 

And the weak vessel, through the chaos wild 

Led by the mighty Angel, — as a child, 

Snatch'd from its crib, and in the mother's arms 

Borne through a midnight tumult of alarms, — 

Escapes the Avrecks ; nor slackens her career, 

Till sink the forms, and cease the sounds of fear, 



And He, who rules the universe at will, 
Saith to the reinless elements, " Be still." 

Then rise sweet hymns of gratulation ; praise 
From hearts and voices, in harmonious lays ; — 
So Israel sang deliverance, when he stood 
By the Red Sea, and saw the morning-flood. 
That in its terrible embraces bore 
The slain pursuers and their spoils on shore. 

Light-breathing gales awhile their course propel, 
The billows roll with pleasurable swell. 
Till the seventh dawn ; when o'er the pure expanse 
The sun, like hghtning, throws his earhest glance, 
"Land I Land!" exclaims the ship-boy from the mast, 
"Land ! Land !" with one electric shock hath pass'd 
From lip to lip, and every eye hath caught 
The cheering glimpse so long, so dearly sought ; 
Yet must imagination half supply 
The doubtful streak, dividing sea and sky ; 
Not clearly known, till in sublimer day. 
From icy cliffs refracted splendours play. 
And clouds of sea-fowl high in ether sweep. 
Or fall like stars through sunshine on the deep. 
'Tis Greenland ! but so desolately bare, 
Amphibious life alone inhabits there ; 
'Tis Greenland ! yet so beautiful the sight, 
The'' Brethren gaze with undisturb'd dehght : 
In silence (as before the throne), they stand. 
And pray, in prospect of that promised land, 
That He, who sends them thither may abide 
Through the waste howling wilderness their guide ; 
And the good shepherd seek his straying flocks. 
Lost on those frozen waves and herbless rocks. 
By the still waters of his comforts lead, 
And in the pastures of salvation feed. 

Their faith must yet be tried : — the sun at noon 
Shrinks from the shadow of the passing moon, 
Till, ray by ray, of all his pomp bereft 
(Save one slight ring of quivering lustre left), 



Total eclipse involves his peerless eye : 

Portentous twilight creeps around the sky ; 

The frighted sea-birds to their haunts repair ; 

There is a freezing stillness in the air, 

As if the blood through Nature's veins ran cold, 

A prodigy so fearful to behold ; 

A few faint stars gleam through the dread serene, 

Trembling and pale spectators of the scene ; 

While the rude mariners, with stern amaze. 

As on some tragic execution gaze, 

When calm but awful guilt is stretcht to feel 

The torturing fire, or dislocating wheel, 

And hfe, like light from yonder orb, retires, 

Spark after spark, till the whole man expires. 

Yet may the darken'd sun and mourning skies 

Point to a higher, hoher sacrifice ; 

The Brethren's thoughts to Calvary's brow ascend, 

Round the Redeemer's Cross their spirits bend. 

And while heaven frowns, earth shudders, graves disclose 

The forms of sleepers, startled from repose, 

They catch the blessing of his latest breath, 

Mark his last look, and through th' eclipse of death 

See lovelier beams than Tabor's vision shed. 

Wreathe a meek halo round his sacred head. 

To Greenland then, with quick compassion, turn 

Their deepest sympathies ; their bosoms burn. 

To her barbarian race, Avith tongues of flame, 

His love, his grief, his glory to proclaim. 

Oh could they view, in this alarming hour. 
Those wretched ones, themselves beneath the poAver 
Of darkness, while the shadow clips the sun ! 
How to their dens the fierce sea-hunters run, 
Who death in every shape of peril brave. 
By storms and monsters, on the faithless wave, 
But now in speechless horror lie aghast. 
Till the mahgnant prodigy be past : 
While bolder females, with tormenting spells, 
Consult their household doo-s as oracles, 



And by the yelping of theii; curs divine 

That still the earth may stand, tlie sun may shine. 

Then forth they creep, and to their offspring tell 

What fate of old a youth and maid befell : 

How, in the age of night, ere day Avas born 

On the blue hills of undiscover'd morn ; 

Where one pale cresset twinkled through the shade, 

Malina and her gay companions play'd 

A thousand mimic sports, as children wont ; 

They hide, they seek, they shoot, harpoon and hunt 

When lo ! Aninga, passionate and young. 

Keen as a wolf, upon his sister sprung. 

And pounced his victim ; — gentler way to woo 

He knew not, or he scorn'd it if he knew : 

Malina snatch'd her lamp, and in the dark 

Dash'd on his felon-front a hideous mark, 

Slipt from his foul embrace (and laugh'd aloud). 

Soft as the rainbow melting from the cloud ; 

Then shot to heaven, and in her wondrous flight 

Transform'd her image, sparkled into hght. 

Became the sun, and through the firmament, 

Forth in the glory of a goddess went. 

Aninga baffled, madden'd, unsubdued, 

By her own beams the fugitive pursued, 

And when she set, his broad, disfigur'd mien 

As the dim moon among the stars was seen ; 

Thenceforward doom'd his sister's steps to chase. 

But ne'er o'ertake in heaven's eternal race. 

Yet when his vanish'd orb might seem to sleep. 

He takes his monthly pastime on the deep. 

Through storms, o'er cataracts, in his Kayak sails. 

Strikes with unerring dart the polar whales. 

Or o'er ice-mountains, in his dog-drawn car, 

Pursues the rein-deer to the farthest star. 

But when eclipse his baleful disk invades. 

He prowls for prey among the Greenland maids. 

Till roaring drums, belabouring sticks, and cries 

Repel the errant Demon to the skies. 



GREENLAND. 



The sun hath cast aside his veil ; — he shines 
With purest splendour till his orb declines ; 
Then landward, marshalling in black array, 
Eruptive vapours drive him from the day ; 
And night again, with premature control. 
Binds light in chains of darkness o'er the pole ; 
Heaven in one ebon mass of horror scowls : 
— Anon a universal whirlwind howls, 
With such precipitation dash'd on high, 
Not from one point, but from the whole dark sky. 
The surges at the onset shrink aghast. 
Borne down beneath the paralyzing blast ; 
But soon the mad tornado slants its course. 
And rolls them into mountains by main force. 
Then utterly embroil'd, through clouds and waves, 
As 'tAvixt two oceans met in conflict, raves. 
Now to the passive bark, alternate tost, 
Above, below, both sea and sky are lost. 
All but the giddy summit, where her keel 
Plangs in light balance on the billowy wheel ; 
Then, as the swallow in his Avindward flight, 
Gluivers the wing, returns, and darts downright. 
She plunges through the bhnd abyss, and o'er 
Her groaning masts the cavern'd waters roar. 
Ruled by the hurricane, no more the helm 
Obeys the pilot ; — seas on seas o'erwhelm 
The deck ; where oft embattled currents meet, 
Foam in white whirlpools, flash to spray, retreat, 
And rack the vessel with their huge turmoils. 
Like the cork float around the fisher's toils. 
Three days of restless agony, that seem 
Of one delirious night the waking dream. 
The mariners in vain their labours ply. 
Or sick at heart in pale despondence lie. 
The Brethren weak, yet firm as when they faced 
AVinter's ice-legions on his own bleak waste. 
In patient hope, that utters no complaint, 
Pray without ceasing ; pray, and never faint ; 



GREENLAND. 



Assured that He, who from the tempest's neck 
Hath loosed his grasp, still holds it at his beck, 
And with a pulse too deep for mortal sense. 
The secret pulse of his omnipotence, 
That beats through every motion of the storm, 
— Can check destruction in its wildest form : 
Bow'd to his will, — their lot how truly blest. 
Who live to serve Him, and who die to rest ! 

To live and serve Him is their Lord's decree ; 
He curbs the wind, He calms th' infuriate sea ; 
The sea and wind their Maker's yoke obey, 
And waft his servants on their destined way. 
Though many a league by that disaster driven 
'Thwart from their course ; with planks and cordage riven. 
With hands disabled, and exhausted strength. 
The active crew refit their bark at length ; 
Along the placid gulf, with heaving sails, 
That catch from every point propitious gales, 
Led like the moon, from infancy to age. 
Round the wide zodiac of her pilgrimage. 
Onward and smooth their voyage they pursue 
Till Greenland's coast again salutes their view. 

'Tis sunset : to the firmament serene, 
Th' Atlantic wave reflects a gorgeous scene ; 
Broad in the cloudless west a belt of gold 
Girds the blue hemisphere ; above unroU'd 
The keen, clear air grows palpable to sight, 
Imbodied in a flush of crimson light, 
Through which the evening star, with milder gleam, 
Descends, to meet her image in the stream. 
Far in the east, what spectacle unknown 
Allures the eye to gaze on it alone ? 
— Amidst black rocks, that lift on either hand 
Their countless peaks, and mark receding land ; 
Amidst a tortuous labyrinth of seas. 
That shine around the arctic Cyclades ; 
Amidst a coast of dreariest continent. 
In many a shapeless promontory rent ; 




— O'er rocks, seas, islands, promontories spread, 

The Ice-Blink rears its undulated head, 

On which the sun, beyond th' horizon shrined, 

Hath left his richest garniture behind ; 

Piled on a hundred arches, ridge by ridge, 

O'er fix'd and fluid strides the Alpine bridge, 

Whose blocks of sapphire seem to mortal eye 

Hewn from cerulean quarries of the sky ; 

With glacier-battlements, that crowd the spheres, 

The slow creation of six thousand years, 

Amidst immensity it towers sublime, 

— Winter's eternal palace, built by Time : 

All human structures by his touch are borne 

Down to the dust ; — mountains themselves are worn 

With his light footsteps ; here for ever grows, 

Amid the region of unmelting snows, 

A monument ; where every flake that falls 

Gives adamantine firmness to the walls. 

The sun beholds no mirror, in his race, 

That shows a brighter image of his face ; 

The stars, in their nocturnal vigils, rest 

Like signal fires on its illumined crest ; 

The gliding moon around the ramparts wheels, 

And all its magic lights and shades reveals ; 

Beneath, the tide with idle fury raves 

To undermine it through a thousand caves ; 

Rent from its roof, though thundering fragments oft 

Plunge to the gulf; immovable aloft. 

From age to age, in air, o'er sea, on land. 

Its turrets heighten and its piers expand. 

Midnight hath told his hour ; the moon yet young. 
Hangs in the argent west her bow unstrung ; 
Larger and fairer, as her lustre fades. 
Sparkle the stars amidst the deepening shades ; 
Jewels more rich than night's regalia gem 
The distant Ice-Blink's spangled diadem ; 
Like a neAv morn from orient darkness, there 
Phosphoric splendours kindle in mid air. 



GREENLAND. 



As though from heaven's self-opening portals came 

Legions of spirits in an orb of flame, 

— Flame, that from every point an arrow sends, 

Far as the concave firmament extends : 

Spun with the tissue of a million lines. 

Glistening like gossamer the welkin shines : 

The constellations in their pride look pale 

Through the quick trembling brilliance of that veil ; 

Then suddenly converged, the meteors rush 

O'er the wide south ; one deep vermilion blush 

O'erspreads Orion glaring on the flood, 

And rabid Sirius foams through fire and blood ; 

Again the circuit of the pole they range. 

Motion and figure every moment change. 

Through all the colours of the rainbow run. 

Or blaze like wrecks of a dissolving sun ; 

Wide ether burns Avith glory, conflict, flight. 

And the glad ocean dances in the light. 

The seaman's jealous eye askance surveys 
This pageantry of evanescent rays. 
While in the horror of misgiving fear 
New storms already thunder on his ear : 
But morning comes, and brings him sweet release ; 
Day shines and sets ; at evening all is peace ; 
Another and another day is past ; 
The fourth appears, — the loveliest and the last ; 
The sails are furl'd ; the anchor drags the sand ; 
The boat hath cross'd the creek ; — the Brethren land. 




CANTO FOURTH. 

Retrospect of ancient Greenland — The Discovery of Iceland, of Greenland, of 
IVineland—The Jfnricegian Colonies on the Kastern and Western Coasts of 
Greenland — The Appearance of the Shraellings, or modern Greenlanders, in the 
West, and the Destruction of the JVorwegian Settlers in that Quarter. 

Here while in peace the weary Pilgrims rest, 

Turn we our voyage from the new-found west, 

Sail up the current of departed time, 

And seek along its banks that vanish'd clime. 

By ancient scalds in Runic verse renown'd. 

Now like old Babylon no longer found. 

— " Oft was I weary when I toil'd at thee ;" 

This, on an oar abandon'd to the sea. 

Some hand had graven : — from what founder'd boat 

It fell ; — how long on ocean's waves afloat ; 

— Who mark'd it with that melancholy line ; 

No record tells : — Greenland ! such fate was thine ; 

Whate'er thou wast, of thee remains no more 

Than a brief legend on a foundling oar ; 

And he, whose song would now revive thy fame, 

Grasps but the shadow of a mighty name. 

From Asia's fertile womb, when Time was young. 
And earth a wreck, the sires of nations sprung ; 
In Shinar's land of rivers. Babel's tower 
Stood the lorn relic of their scatter'd power ; 
A broken pillar, snapt as from the spheres. 
Slow-wasting through the silent lapse of years. 
While o'er the regions, by the flood destroy'd. 
The builders breathed new life throughout the void, 
Soul, passion, intellect ; till blood of man 
Through every artery of Nature ran ; 
O'er eastern islands pour'd its quickening stream, 
Caught the warm crimson of the western beam, 
Beneath the burning line made fountains start 
In the dry wilderness of Afric's heart. 
And through the torpid north, with genial heat, 
Taught love's exhilarating pulse to beat ; 



GREENLAND. 



Till the great sun, in his perennial round, 
Man, of all climes the restless native, found, 
Pursuing folly in his vain career, 
As if existence were immortal here ; 
While on the fathers' graves the sons, untaught 
B}- their mischance, the same illusions sought. 
By gleams and shadows measured wo and bliss, 
As tliough unborn for any world but this. 

Five thousand years, unvisited, unknown, 
Greenland lay slumbering in the frozen zone, — . 
While heaven's resplendent host pursued their way 
To light the wolf and eagle to their prey. 
And tempests o'er the main their terrors spread 
To rock Leviathan vipon his bed ; — 
Ere Ingolf his undaunted flag unfurl'd 
To search the secrets of the polar world. 
'Twas liberty, that fires the coldest veins, 
And exile, famine, death, prefers to chains ; 
'Twas liberty, through floods unplough'd before. 
That led his gallant crew from Norway's shore ; 
They cut their cable, and in thunder broke 
With their departing oars the tyrant's yoke ; 
The deep their country, and their bark their home, 
A floating isle, on which they joy'd to roam 
Amidst immensity : with waves and wind. 
Now sporting and now wrestling ; — unconfined, 
Save by the blue surrounding firmament. 
Full, yet for ever widening as they Avent : 
Thus sail'd those mariners, unheeding where 
They found a port, if Freedom anchor'd there. 

By stars that never set, their course they steer'd. 
And northward with indignant impulse veer'd. 
For sloth had lull'd and luxury o'errun. 
And bondage seized, the realms that loved the sun. 
At length by mountain-ice, with perils strange. 
Menaced, repell'd, and forced their track to change. 
They bade the unimprison'd raven fly, 
A living compass through the chartless sky ; 



GREENLAND. 



Up to the zenith, swift as fire, he soar'd, 
Through the clear boundless atmosphere explored 
The dim horizon stretcht beneath his sight ; 
Then to the west full-onward shot his flight : 
Thither they follow ; tiU from Thule's rocks, 
Around the bird of tempests rose the flocks 
Of screaming sea-fowl, widening ring o'er ring, 
Till heaven grew dark ; then wheeHng on the wing 
Landward they whiten all the rocks below, 
Or diving melt into the gulf like snow. 
Pleased with the proud discovery, Ingolf gave 
His lintel and his doorposts to the wave, 
Divining, as they drifted to the strand, 
The Avill of destiny, — the place to land. 
There on a homeless soil his foot he placed, 
Framed his hut-palace, colonized the waste, 
And ruled his horde with patriarchal sway : 
— Where justice reigns, 'tis freedom to obey : 
And there his race, in long succession blest, 
(Like generations in the eagle's nest. 
Upon their own hereditary rock,) 
Flourish'd, invincible to every shock 
Of time, chance, foreign force, or civil rage, — 
A noble dynasty from age to age ; 
And Iceland shone for generous lore renown'd, 
A northern hght, when all was gloom around. 
Ere long, by brave adventurers on the tide, 
A new Hesperian region was descried, 
Which fancy deem'd, or fable feign'd, so fair, 
Fleets from old NorAvay pour'd their settlers there, 
Who traced and peopled far that double shore, 
Round whose repelling rocks two oceans roar. 
Till at the southern promontory, tost 
By tempests, each is in its rival lost. 
Thus C4reenland (so that arctic world they named) 
Was planted, and to utmost Calpe famed 
For weahh exhaustless, which her seas could boast, 
And prodigies of Nature on her coast ; 



Where, in the green recess of every glen, 

The House of Prayer o'ertopt th' abodes of men, 

And flocks and cattle grazed by summer-streams, 

That track'd the valleys with meandering gleams : 

While on the mountains ice eternal frown'd. 

And growing glaciers deepen'd tow'rds the ground 

Year after year, as centuries roll'd away, 

Nor lost one moment till that judgment-day 

When eastern Greenland from the world was rent 

Ingulf'd, — or fix'd one frozen continent. 

'Twere long and dreary to recount in rhyme 
The crude traditions of that long-lost clime : 
To sing of wars, by barbarous chieftains waged. 
In Avliich as fierce and noble passions raged. 
Heroes as subtle, bold, remorseless, fought. 
And deeds as dark and terrible were wrought. 
As round Troy-walls became the splendid themes 
Of Homer's song, and Jove's Olympian dreams ; 
When giant-prowess, in the iron field. 
With single arm made phalanx'd legions yield ; 
When battle was but massacre, — the strife 
Of murderers, — steel to steel, and life to life. 
— Who follows Homer takes the field too late ; 
'Though stout as Hector, sure of Hector's fate, 
A wound as from Achilles' spear he feels. 
Falls, and adorns the Grecian's chariot-wheels. 

Nor stay we monkish legends to rehearse ; 
To build their cloister-walls in Gothic verse ; 
Of groves and gardens, wine and music tell ; 
Fresh roses breathing round the hermit's cell, 
And baths, in which Diana's nymphs might lave, 
— From earth's self-opening veins the blood-warm Avave, 
Whose genial streams, amidst departed ice, 
Made laps of verdure, — like those isles of spice 
In eastern seas ; or rich oases, graced 
With flowers and fountains, in the Lybian Avaste. 

Rather the muse w^ould stretch a mightier wing, 
Of a new world the earliest dawn to sing ; 



GREENLAND. 



How, — long ere Science, in a dream of thought, 
Earth's younger daughter to Columbus brought, 
And sent him, like the Faerie Prince, in quest 
Of that "bright vestal throned in the west,"* 
— Greenland's bold sons, by instinct, sallied forth 
On barks, like icebergs, drifting from the north, 
Cross'd without magnet undiscover'd seas, 
And, all surrendering to the stream and breeze, 
Touch'd on the line of that twin-bodied land. 
That stretches forth to either pole a hand. 
From arctic wilds that see no winter-sun. 
To where the oceans of the world are one. 
And round Magellan's straits, Fuego's shore, 
Atlantic, Indian, and Pacific roar. 

Regions of beauty there these rovers found. 
The flowery hills with emerald woods were crown'd ; 
Spread o'er the vast savannahs, buffalo herds 
Ranged without master ; and the bright-wing'd birds 
Made gay the sunshine as they glanced along, 
Or turn'd the air to music Avith their song. 

Here from his mates a German youth had stray'd. 
Where the broad river cleft the forest glade ; 
Swarming with alligator-shoals, the flood 
Blazed in the sun, or moved in clouds of blood ; 
The wild boar rustled headlong through the brake ; 
Like a live arrow leap'd the rattle-snake ; 
The uncouth shadow of the climbing bear 
Crawl'd on the grass, while he aspired in air ; 
Anon with hoofs, like hail, the greenwood rang, 
Among the scattering deer a panther sprang : 
The stripling fear'd not, — yet he trod with awe. 
As if enchantment breathed o'er all he saw. 
Till in his path uprose a wilding vine ; 
— Then o'er his memory rush'd the noble Rhine ; 
Home and its joys, with fulness of delight. 
So rapt his spirit, so beguiled his sight, 
That, in those glens of savage solitude, 
Vineyards and corn-fields, towns and spires he view'd, 



GREENLAND. 



And through the image-chamber of his soul 

The days of other j'ears hke shadows stole ; 

All that he once had been, again he grew, 

Through every stage of life he pass'd anew; 

The playmates of his infancy were there. 

With dimpled checks, blue eyes, and flaxen hair ; 

The blythe companions of his riper youth, 

And one whose heart was love, whose soul was truth. 

— When the quick-mingling pictures of that dream 

(Like broken scenery on a troubled stream, 

Where sky and landscape, light and darkness, run 

Through widening circles,) harmonized in one. 

His father's cot appeared, with vine-leaves drest, 

And clusters pendent round the swalloAv's nest ; 

In front the little garden, at whose g"ate, 

Amidst their progeny, his parents sate. 

He only absent ; — but his mother's eye 

Look'd through a tear ; — she reach'd him with a sigh : 

Then in a moment vanish' d time and space, 

And with a shout he rush'd to her embrace ; 

Round hills and dales the joyful tidings spread. 

All ran to Avelcome Tyrker from the dead. 

With bhss inebriate, in that giddy trance, 

He led his vraltzing partner through the dance ; 

And while he pluck'd the grapes that blush'd at hand. 

Trod the rich wine-press in his native land, 

Q,uaff'd the full flowing goblet, loosed his tongue, 

And songs of vintage, harvest, battle sung, 

At length his shipmates came : their laughter broke 

The gay delusion ; in alarm he woke : 

Transport to silent melancholy changed ; 

At once from love, and joy, and hope estranged, 

O'er his blank mind, with cold, bereaving spell, 

Came that heart-sickness which no tongue can tell ; 

— Felt when, in foreign climes, midst sounds unknoAvn, 

We hear the speech or music of our owi», 

Roused to delight, from drear abstraction start, 

And feel our country beating at our heart ; 



GREENLAND. 



The rapture of a moment ; — in its birth 

It perishes for ever from the earth ; 

And dumb, hke shipwreck'd mariners, we stand. 

Eyeing by turns the ocean and the land. 

Breathless ; — till tears the struggling thought release, 

And the lorn spirit weeps itself to peace. 

JFlneland the glad discoverers call'd that shore, 
And back the tidings of its riches bore ; 
But soon return'd with colonizing bands, 
— Men that at home would sigh for unknown lands ; 
Men of all weathers, fit for every toil, 
War, commerce, pastime, peace, adventure, spoil ; 
Bold master-spirits, where they touch'd they gain'd 
Ascendance; where they fix'd their foot they reign'd. 
Both coasts they long inherited, though wide 
Dissever'd ; stemming to and fro the tide. 
Free as the Syrian dove explores the sky, 
Their helm their hope, their compass in their eye. 
They found at will, where'er they pleased to roam. 
The ports of strangers or their northern home. 
Still midst tempestuous seas and zones of ice, 
Loved as their own, their unlost Paradise. 
Yet was their Paradise for ever lost : 
War, famine, pestilence, the power of frost. 
Their woes combining, wither'd from the earth 
This late creation, like a timeless birth. 
The fruit of age and weakness, forced to hght. 
Breathing awhile, — relapsing into night. 

Ages had seen the vigorous race, that sprung 
From Norway's stormj^ forelands, rock'd when young 
In ocean's cradle, hardening as they rose, 
Like mountain-pines amidst perennial snows 
— Ages had seen these sturdiest sons of Time 
Strike root and flourish in that ruffian clime. 
Commerce, with lovelier lands and wealthier hold. 
Yet spurn the lures of luxury and gold ; 
Beneath the umbrage of the Gallic vine, 
For moonlight snows and cavern-shelter pine ; 




Turn from Campanian fields a lofty eye 
To gaze upon the glorious Alps, and sigh, 
Remembering Greenland ; more and more endear'd, 
As far and farther from its shores they steer'd ; 
Greenland their world, — and all was strange beside ; 
Elsewhere they wander'd ; here they lived and died. 

At length a swarthy tribe, without a name, 
Unknown the point of windward whence they came ; 
The power by which stupendous gulfs they cross'd, 
Or compass'd wilds of everlasting frost, 
Ahke mysterious ; — found their sudden way 
To Greenland ; pour'd along the western bay 
Their straggling families ; and seized the soil 
For their domain, the ocean for their spoil. 
Skraellings the Normans call'd these hordes in scorn. 
That seem'd created on the spot, — though born 
In trans-Atlantic climes, and thither brought 
By paths as covert as the birth of thought ; 
They were at once ; — the swallow-tribes in spring 
Thus daily multiply upon the wing. 
As if the air, their element of flight. 
Brought forth new broods from darkness every night ; 
SHpt from the secret hand of Providence, 
They come we see not how, nor know we whence. 

A stunted, stern, uncouth, amphibious stock, 
Hewn from the living marble of the rock. 
Or sprung from mermaids, and in ocean's bed, 
With ores and seals, in sunless caverns bred. 
They might have held, from unrecorded time, 
Sole patrimony in that hideous clime, 
So lithe their limbs, so fenced their frames to bear 
The intensest rigours of the polar air ; 
Nimble, and muscular, and keen to run 
The rein-deer down a circuit of the sun ; 
To climb the slippery cliffs, explore their cells, 
And storm and sack the sea-birds' citadels ; 
In bands, through snows, the mother-bears to trace, 
Slay with their darts the cubs in her embrace, 



And, while she hck'd their bleeding wounds, to brave 

Her deadliest vengeance in her inmost cave : 

Train'd with inimitable skill to float. 

Each, balanced in his bubble of a boat, 

AVith dexterous paddle steering through the spray, 

With poised harpoon to strike his plunging prey, 

As though the skiff, the seaman, oar, and dart 

Were one compacted body, by one heart 

With instinct, motion, pulse, empower'd to ride 

A human Nautilus upon the tide ; 

Or with a fleet of Kayaks to assail 

The desperation of the stranded whale. 

When wedged 'twixt jagged rocks he writhes and rolls 

In agony among the ebbing shoals, 

Lashing the Avaves to foam, until the flood, 

From wounds, like geysers, seems a bath of blood. 

Echo all night dumb-pealing to his roar. 

Till morn beholds him slain along the shore. 

Of these, — hereafter should the lyre be strung 
To arctic themes, — may glorious da3rs be sung ; 
Now be our task the sad reverse to tell. 
How in their march the nobler Normans fell f 
— Whether by dire disease, that turn'd the breath 
Of bounteous heaven to pestilence and death. 
In number, strength, and spirit worn away, 
Their lives became the cool assassin's prey ; 
— Or in the battle-field, as SkraeUings boast. 
These pigmies put to flight their giant-host, 
When front to front on scowling cliffs they stood, 
' And shot their barbs athwart the parting flood ; 
Arrow smote arrow, dart encounter'd dart, 
From hand to hand, impaling heart for heart ; 
Till spent their missiles : quick as in a dream 
The images are changed ; across the stream 
The SkraeUings rush'd, the precipices scaled ; 
— O'erwhehn'd by multitude, the Normans fail'd : 
A scatter'd remnant to the south retired. 
But one by one along their route expired : 



GREENLAND. 



They perish'd ; — History can no more relate 

Of their obscure and unlamented fate : 

They perish'd ; — yet along that western shore, 

Where Commerce spread her colonies of yore, 

Ruins of temples and of homes are traced, 

— Steps of magnificence amidst the waste 

Where Time hath trod, and left those wrecks to show 

That life hath been, where all is Death below. 



CANTO FIFTH. 

The Depopulation of the JVorwegian Colonies on the Eastern Coast of Oreenland, 
and the Abandonment of Intercourse with it from Europe, in consequence of the 
Increase of the Arctic Ices, about the Beginning of the Fifteenth Century. 

Launch on the gulf, my little Greenland bark ! 

Bear me through scenes unutterably dark ; 

Scenes with the mystery of Nature seal'd. 

Nor till the day of doom to be reveal'd. 

What though the spirits of the arctic gales 

Freeze round thy prow, or fight against thy sails, 

Safe as Arion, whom the dolphin bore, 

Enamour'd of his music, to the shore. 

On thee adventuring o'er an unknown main, 

I raise to warring elements a strain 

Of kindred harmony : — Oh, lend your breath. 

Ye tempests ! while I sing this reign of death : 

Utter dark sayings of the days of old ; 

In parables upon my harp unfold 

Deeds perish'd from remembrance ; truth, array'd, 

Like heaven by night, in emblematic shade. 

When shines the horoscope, and star on star, 

By what they are not lead to what they are ; 

Atoms, that twinkle in an infant's eye, 

Are worlds, suns, systems in th' unbounded sky : 

Thus the few fabled Avoes my strains create 

Are hieroglyphics in a book of Fate ; 



GREENLAND. 245 

And while the shadowy symbols I unroll, 
Imagination reads a direr scroll. 
Wake, ye wild visions ! o'er the northern deep. 
On clouds and winds, like warrior-spectres SAveep ; 
Show by what plagues and hurricanes destroy'd, 
A breathing realm became a torpid void. 

The floods are raging, and the gales blow high, 
Lo.w as a dungeon-roof impends the skjs^; 
Prisoners of hope, between the clouds and waves. 
Six fearless sailors man yon boat, that braves 
Peril redoubling upon peril past : 
— From childhood nurslings of the wayward blast, 
Aloft as o'er a buoyant arch they go, 
AVhose keystone breaks ; — as deep they plunge below; 
Unyielding, though the strength of man be vain ; 
Struggling, though borne like surf along the main ; 
In front, a battlement of rocks ; in rear. 
Billow on billow bounding : near, more near. 
They verge to ruin ; — life and death depend 
On the next impulse ; — shrieks and prayers ascend ; 
When, like the fish that mounts on drizzling wings, 
Sheer from the gulf th' ejected vessel springs, 
And grounds on inland ice, beyond the track 
Of hissing foam-Avreaths, whence the tide roU'd back ; 
Then ere that tide, returning to the charge, 
Swallows the wreck, the captives are at large. 
On either hand steep hills obstruct their path ; 
Behind, the ocean roaring in his wrath, 
Mad as a Libyan wilderness by night. 
With all its lions up, in chase or fight. 
The fugitives right onward shun the beach, 
Nor tarry till the inmost cove they reach, 
Recluded in the labyrinthine dell. 
Like the last hollow of a spiral shell. 
There, with the axe or knife which haste could save, 
They build a house ; — perhaps they dig a grave : 
Of solid snow, well-squared, and piled in blocks, 
Brilliant as hewn from alabaster rocks. 



GREENLAND. 



Their palace rises, narrowing to the roof, 
And freezes into marble, tempest-proof; 
Night closing round, within its shade they creep, 
And weary Nature sinks at once to sleep. 

Oh ! could we walk amid- 1 their dreams, and see 
All that they have been, are, or wish to be. 
In fancy's world ! — each at his own fireside : 
One greets a parent ; one a new-made bride ; 
Another clasps his babe with fond embrace, 
A smile in slumber mantling o'er his face ; 
All dangers are forgotten in a kiss, 
Or but remember'd to exalt the bliss. 
— One Avounded sufferer wakes, with pain opprest, 
Yet are his thoughts at home among the rest ; 
Then beams his eye, his heart dilated burns, 
Till the dark vigil to a vision turns, 
That vision to reality : and home 
Is so endear'd, he vows no more to roam. 
Ha ! suddenly he starts : with trembling lips, 
Salt shower drops oozing through the roof, he sips : 
Aware that instant, yet alarm' d too late, 
— The sea hath burst its barrier, fix'd their fate ; 
Escape impossible : the tempests urge 
Through the deep dell the inundating surge : 
Nor wall nor roof th' impetuous flood controls ; 
Above, around, within, the deluge rolls : 
He calls his comrades ; — ere their doom be known, 
'Tis past ; — the snow-house utterly o'erthrown, 
Its inmates vanish ; never to be found. 
Living or dead, on habitable ground. 

There is a beauteous hamlet in the vale ; 
Green are the fields around it ; sweetly sail 
The twilight shadows o'er the darkening scene, 
Earth, air, and ocean, all alike serene ; 
Dipt in the hues of sunset, wreath'd in zones. 
The clouds are resting on their mountain-thrones ; 
One peak alone exalts its glacier crest, 
A golden paradise, above the rest ; 



GREENLAND. 



Thither the day Avith lingering steps retires, 

And in its own blue element expires : 

Thus Aaron laid his gorgeous robes aside 

On Horeb's consecrated top, and died. 

The moon, meanwhile, o'er ocean's sombre bed, 

New-risen, a thousand glow-worm lights hath spread ; 

From east to west the wildfire splendours glance. 

And all the billows in her glory dance ; 

Till, in mid-heaven, her orb might seem the eye 

Of Providence, wide-watching from the sky, , 

While nature slumbers ; — emblem of His grace 

Whose presence fills the infinite of space. 

The clouds have left the mountains ; coldly bright. 
Their icy summits shed cerulean hght ; 
The steep decHvities between assume 
A horror of unfathomable gloom : 
The village sleeps ; — from house to house, the ear 
Of yonder sentinel no sound can hear : 
A maniac ; — he, while calmer heads repose. 
Takes his night round, to tell the stars his Avoes ; 
Woes, which his noble heart to frenzy stung ; 
— He hath no bard, and they remain unsung. 
A warrior once, victorious arms he bore. 
And bears them still, aUhough his wars are o'er ; 
For 'tis his boast, with shield and sword in hand, 
To be the guardian angel of the land. 
Mark with what stern solemnity he stalks. 
And to himself as to a legion talks : 
Now deep in council with his chiefs ; anon 
He starts, as at the trumpet ; leads them on, 
And wins the day ; — his battle-shout alarms 
None but the infant in the nurse's arms : 
Soon hush'd, but closer to her side, it sleeps ; 
While he abroad his watch in silence keeps. 

At every door he haUs, and brings a sigh. 
But leaves a blessing, when he marches by ; 
He stops ; from that low roof, a deadly groan 
Hath made unutterable anguish known ; 



GREENLAND. 



A spirit into eternity hath pass'd ; 

A spouse, a father, there liath breathed his last. 

The widow and her httle ones Aveep not ; 

In its excess their misery is forgot, 

One dumb, dark moment ; — then from all their eyes 

Ruin the salt tears, and loud their Availings rise : 

Ah ! little think that family forlorn 

How brief the parting ; — they shall meet ere morn ! 

For lo ! the witness of their pangs hath caught 

A sight that startles madness into thought : 

Back from their gate unconsciously he reels ; 

A resurrection of his soul he feels. 

There is a motion in the air : his eye 

Blinks as it fear'd the falling of the sky. 

The splendid peak of adamantine ice, 

At sunset like an earthly paradise. 

And in the moon of such empyrean hue, 

It seem'd to bring the unseen world to view ; 

— That splendid peak, the Power (which to the spheres 

Had piled its turrets through a thousand years) 

Touches, as lightly as the passing wind. 

And the huge mass, o'erbalanced, undermined, 

And dislocated from its base of snow. 

Slides down the slope, majestically slow, 

Till o'er the precipice, down headlong sent, 

And in ten thousand thousand spangles rent. 

It piles a hill where spread a vale before : 

— From rock to rock the echoes round the shore 

Tell with their deep artillery the fate 

Of the whole village crush'd beneath its weight, 

— The sleepers wake, — their homes in ruins hurl'd, — 

They wake — from death into another world. 

The gazing maniac, palsied into stone. 

Amidst the wreck of ice, survives alone ; 

A sudden interval of reason gleams. 

Steady and clear, amidst his wildering dreams, 

But shows reality in such a shape, 

'Twere rapture back to frenzy to escape. 



GREENLAND. 

Again the clouds of desolation roll, 
Blotting all old remembrance from his soul : 
Whate'er his sorrows or his joys have been, 
His spirit grows imbodied through this scene ; 
With eyes of agony, and clenching hands, 
Fix'd in recoil, a frozen form he stands. 
And, smit with wonder at his people's doom, 
Becomes the monument upon their tomb. 
j Behold a scene, magnificent and new ; 

Nor land nor Avater meet th' excursive view ; 
The round horizon girds one frozen plain. 
The mighty tombstone of the buried main, 
Where, dark and silent, and unfelt to flow, 
A dead sea sleeps with all its tribes below. 
But heaven is still itself; the deep blue sky 
I Comes down with smiles to meet the glancing eye, 

! Though if a keener sight its bound would trace. 

The arch recedes through everlasting space. 
j The sun, in morning glory, mounts his throne, 

i Nor shines he here in solitude unknown ; 

j North, south, and west, by dogs or reindeer draAvn, 

I Careering sledges cross th' unbroken lawn, 

i And bring from baj's and forelands round the coast, 

! Youth, beauty, valour, Greenland's proudest boast, 

I Who thus, in winter's long and social reign. 

Hold feasts and tournaments upon the main. 
When, built of solid floods, his bridge extends 
A highway o'er the gulf to meeting friends. 
Whom rocks impassable, or winds and tide. 
Fickle and false, in summer months divide. 

The scene runs round with motion, rings with mirth, 
— No happier spot upon the peopled earth ; 
The drifted snow to dust the travellers beat, 
Th' uneven ice is flint beneath their feet. 
Here tents, a gay encampment, rise around. 
Where music, song, and revelry resound ; 
There the blue smoke upwreathes a hundred spires, 
Where humbler groups have lit their pine-wood fires. 



GREENLAND. 



Ere long they quit the tables ; knights and dames 

Lead the blithe multitude to boisterous games. 

Bears, wolves, and lynxes, yonder head the chase ; 

Here start the harness' d rein-deer in the race ; 

Borne without wheels, a flight of rival cars 

Track the ice-firmament, like shooting stars, 

Right to the goal, converging as they run, 

They dwindle through the distance into one. 

Where smoother waves have form'd a sea of glass, 

With pantomimic change the skaiters pass ; 

Now toil like ships 'gainst wind and stream ; then wheel 

Like flames blown suddenly asunder ; reel 

Like drunkards ; then dispersed in tangents wide. 

Away with speed invisible they ghde. 

Peace in their hearts, death-weapons in their hands, 

Fierce in mock-battle meet fraternal bands. 

Whom the same chiefs ereAvhile to conflict led. 

When friends by friends, by kindred kindred bled. 

Here youthful rings with pipe and drum advance, 

And foot the mazes of the giddy dance ; 

Gray-beard spectators, with illumined eye, 

Lean on their staves, and talk of days gone by ; 

Children, who mimic all, from pipe and drum 

To chase and battle, dream of years to come : 

Those years to come the young shall ne'er behold ; 

The days gone by no more rejoice the old. 

There is a boy, a solitary boy, 
Who takes no part in all this whirl of joy, 
Yet, in the speechless transport of his soul 
He lives, and moves, and breathes throughout the whole: 
Him should destruction spare, the plot of earth, 
That forms his play-ground, gave a poet birth. 
Who, on the wings of his immortal lays. 
Thine heroes, Greenland ! to the stars shall raise. 
It must not be : — abruptly from the show 
He turns his eyes, his thoughts are gone below 
To sound the depths of ocean, where his mind 
Creates the wonders which it cannot find. 



GREENLAND. 



Listening, as oft he listens in a shell 

To the mock tide's alternate fall and swell, 

He kneels upon the ice, — inclines his ear, 

And hears, — or does he only seem to hear ? — 

A sound, as though the Genius of the deep 

Heaved a long sigh, awakening out of sleep. 

He starts ; — 'twas but a pulse within his brain ! 

No ; — for he feels it beat through every vein ; 

Groan following groan, (as from a giant's breast. 

Beneath a burying mountain, ill at rest.) 

With awe ineffable his spirit thrills, 

And rapture fires his blood, while terror chills. 

The keen expression of his eye alarms 

His mother ; she hath caught him in her arms. 

And learn'd the cause ; — that cause, no sooner known. 

From lip to lip, o'er many a league is flown ; 

Voices to voices, prompt as signals, rise 

In shrieks of consternation to the skies : 

Those skies, meanwhile, with gathering darkness scowl; 

Hollow and winterly the bleak winds howl. 

— From morn till noon had ether smiled serene, 

Save one black-belted cloud, far eastward seen. 

Like a snow-mountain ; — there in ambush lay 

Th' undreaded tempest, panting for his prey ; 

That cloud by stealth hath through the Avelkin spread, 

And hangs in meteor-twihght over-head ; 

At foot, beneath the adamantine floor, 

Loose in their prison-house the surges roar : 

To every eye, ear, heart, th' alarm is given. 

And landward crowds, (like flocks of sea-fowl driven. 

When storms are on the Aving,) in wild affi'ight. 

On foot, in sledges, urge their panic flight. 

In hope the refuge of the shore to gain 

Ere the disruption of the strugghng main. 

Foretold by many a stroke, like lightning sent 

In thunder, through th' unstable continent, 

Which now, elastic on the swell below, 

Rolls his^h in undulation to and fro. 



GREENLAND. 



Men, reindeer, dogs, the giddy impulse feel, 
And, jostling headlong, hack and forward reel : 
While snow, sleet, hail, or whirling gusts of wind, 
Exhaust, hewilder, stop the breath, and blind. 
All is dismay and uproar ; some have found 
Death for deliverance, as they leap'd on ground, 
Swept back into the flood :— but hope is vain : 
Ere half the fugitives the beach can gain. 
The fix'd ice, severing from the shore, with shocks 
Of earthquake violence, bounds against the rocks ; 
Then suddenly, while on the verge they stand, 
The whole recoils for ever from the land, 
And leaves a gulf of foam along the shore, 
In Avhich whoever plunge are seen no more. 

Ocean, meanwhile, abroad hath burst the roof 
That sepulchred his waves ; he bounds aloof. 
In boiling cataracts, as volcanoes spout 
Their fiery fountains, gush the waters out ; 
The frame of ice Avith dire explosion rends, 
And down th' abyss the mingled crowd descends. 
Heaven ! from this closing horror hide thy light ; 
Cast thy thick mantle o'er it, gracious Night ! 
These screams of mothers Avith their infants lost, 
These groans of agony from wretches tost 
On rocks and whirlpools, — in thy storms be drown'd, 
The crash of mountain-ice to atoms ground. 
And rage of elements ! — while winds, that yell 
Like demons, peal the universal knell. 
The shrouding waves around their Hmbs shall spread, 
"And Darkness be the burier of the dead." 
Their pangs are o'er : — at morn the tempests cease. 
And the freed ocean rolls himself to peace ; 
Broad to the sun his heaving breast expands. 
He holds his mirror to a hundred lands ; 
While cheering gales pursue the eager chase 
Of billows round immeasurable space.* 

Where are the multitudes of yesterday ? 
At morn they came ; at eve they pass'd away. 



GREENLAND. 



Yet some survive ; — yon castellated pile 

Floats on the surges, like a fairy isle ; 

Pre-eminent upon its peak, behold. 

With walls of amethyst and roofs of gold, 

The semblance of a city ; towers and spires 

Glance in the firmament with opal fires : 

Prone from those heights pellucid fountains flow 

O'er pearly meads, through emerald vales below. 

No lovelier pageant moves beneath the sky,^ 

Nor one so mournful to the nearer eye ; 

Here, Avhen the bitterness of death had pass'd 

O'er others, with their sledge and reindeer cast, 

Five wretched ones, in dumb despondence wait 

The lingering issue of a nameless fate ; 

A bridal party : — mark yon reverend sage 

In the brown vigour of autumnal age ; 

His daughter in her prime ; the youth, who Avon 

Her love by miracles of prowess done ; 

With these, two meet companions of their joy, 

Her younger sister, and a gallant boy. 

Who hoped, like him, a gentle heart to gain 

By valorous enterprise on land or main. 

— These, when the ocean-pavement fail'd their feet, 

Sought on a glacier's crags a safe retreat ; 

But in the shock, from its foundations torn. 

That mass is slowly o'er the Avaters borne. 

An ice-berg ! — on Avhose v'erge all day they stand. 

And eye the blank horizon's ring for land. 

All night around a dismal flame they Aveep : 

Their sledge, by piecemeal, lights the hoary deep. 

Morn brings no comfort ; at her daAvn expire 

The latest embers of their latest fire ; 

For Avarmth and food the patient reindeer bleeds, 

Happier in death than those he Avarms and feeds. 

— How long, by that precarious raft upbuoy'd. 

They blindly drifted on a shorleess void ; 

HoAV long they sufler'd, or hoAv soon they foimd 

Rest in the gulf, or peace on living ground ; 



GREENLAND. 



— Whether, by hunger, cold, and grief consumed, 

They perish'd miserably — and unentomb'd 

(While on tliat frigid bier their corses laj^), 

Became the sea-fowl's or the sea-bear's prey : 

— Whether the wasting mound, by swift degrees, 

Exhaled in mist and vanish'd from the seas, 

While they, too weak to struggle even in death, 

Lock'd in each other's arms, resign'd their breath, 

And their white skeletons, beneath the wave, 

Lie intertwined in one sepulchral cave ; 

— Or meeting some Norwegian bark at sea, 

They deem'd its deck a world of liberty ; 

— Or sunward sailing, on green Erin's sod. 

They kneel'd and worshipp'd a delivering God, 

Where yet the blood they brought from Greenland runs 

Among the noblest of our sister's sons, 

— Is all unknown : — their ice-berg disappears 

Amidst the flood of unreturning years. 

Ages are fled ; and Greenland's hour draws nigh ; 
Seal'd is the judgment ; all her race must die ; 
Commerce forsakes th' unvoyageable seas, 
That year by year with keener rigour freeze ; 
Th' embargoed waves in narrower channels roll 
To blue Spitzbergen and the utmost pole ; 
A hundred colonies, erewhile that lay 
On the green marge of many a shelter'd bay, 
Lapse to the w^ilderness ; their tenants throng 
Where streams in summer, turbulent and strong, 
With molten ice from inland Alps supplied. 
Hold free communion with the breathing tide, 
That from the heart of ocean sends the flood 
Of living water round the world, like blood ; 
But Greenland's pulse shall slow and slower beat, 
Till the last spark of genial warmth retreat, 
And, like a palsied limb of Nature's frame, 
Greenland be nothing but a place and name. 
That crisis comes ; the wafted fuel fails ;" 
The cattle perish ; famine long prevails : 



GREENLAND. 



With torpid sloth, intenser seasons bind 
The strength of muscle and the spring of mind ; 
Man droops, his spirits waste, his powers decay, 
— His generation soon shall pass away. 

At moonless midnight, on this naked coast, 
How beautiful in heaven the starry host ! 
With lambent brilliance o'er these cloister-walls, 
Slant from the firmament a meteor falls ; 
A steadier flame from yonder beacon streams, 
To hght the vessel, seen in golden dreams 
By many a pining wretch, whose slumbers feign 
The bliss for which he looks at morn in vain. 
Two years are gone, and half expired a third 
(The nation's heart is sick with hope deferr'd), 
Since last for Europe sail'd a Greenland prow. 
Her whole marine, — so shorn is Greenland now, 
Though once, like clouds in ether unconfined, 
Her naval wings Avere spread to every wind. 
The monk, who sits, the weary hours to count, 
In the lone block-house on the beacon-momit, 
'Watching the east, beholds the morning star 
Eclipsed at rising o'er the waves afar. 
As if — for so would fond expectance think — 
A sail had cross'd it on the horizon's brink. 
His fervent soul, in ecstasy outdrawn. 
Glows with the shadows kindling through the dawn. 
Till every bird that flashes through the brine 
Appears an arm'd and gallant brigantine ; 
And every sound along the air that comes, 
The voice of clarions and the roll of drums. 
— 'Tis she ! 'tis she ! the well-known keel at last, 
With Greenland's banner streaming at the mast ; 
The fuU-swoln sails, the spring-tide, and the breeze, 
Waft on her way the pilgrim of the seas. 
The monks at matins issuing from their cells, 
Spread the glad tidings ; while their convent-bells 
Wake town and country, sea and shore, to bUss 
Unknown for years on any morn but this. 



GREENLAND. 



Men, women, children throng the joyous strand, 

Whose mob of moving shadows o'er the sand 

Lengthen to giants, while the hovering sun 

Lights up a thousand radiant points from one. 

The pilots launch their boats : — a race ! a race ! 

The strife of oars is seen in every face ; 

Arm against arm puts forth its might to reach, 

And guide the welcome stranger to the beach. 

— Shouts from the shore, the cliffs, the boats, arise : 

No voice, no signal from the ship replies ; 

Nor on the deck, the yards, the bow, the stern, 

Can keenest eye a human form discern. 

Oh ! that those eyes were open'd, there to see, 

How, in serene and dreadful majesty, 

Sits the destroying Angel at the helm ! 

— He, who hath lately march'd from realm to realm, 

And from the palace to the peasant's shed. 

Made all the living kindred to the dead : 

Nor man alone, dumb nature felt his wrath, 

Drought, mildew, murrain, strew'd his carnage-path : 

Harvest and vintage cast their timeless fruit. 

Forests before him wither'd from the root. 

To Greenland now, with unexhausted pqwer, 

He comes commission'd ; and in evil hour 

Propitious elements prepare his Avay ; 

His day of landing is a festal day. 

A boat arrives ; — to those who scale the deck, 
Of life appears but one disastrous wreck ; 
Fallen from the rudder, which he fain had grasp'd, 
But stronger Death his wrestling hold unclasp'd ; 
The film of darkness freezing o'er his eyes, 
A lukewarm corpse, the brave commander lies ; 
Survivor sole of all his buried crew, 
Whom one by one the rife contagion slew, 
.Tust when the cliffs of Greenland cheer'd his sight, 
Even from their pinnacle his soul took flight. 
Chill'd at the spectacle, the pilots gaze 
One on anotlier, lost in blank amaze ; 



GREENLAND. 



But from approaching boats, when rivals throng, 
They seize the helm, in silence steer along, 
And cast their anchor, midst exulting cries. 
That make the rocks the echoes of the skies. 
Till the mysterious signs of woes to come. 
Circled by whispers, strike the uproar dumb. 
Rumour affirms, that by some heinous spell 
Of Lapland witches, crew and captain fell ; 
None guess the secret of perfidious fate. 
Which all shall know too soon, — yet know too late. 
The monks, who claim the ship, divide the stores 
Of food and raiment at their convent-doors. 
— A mother, hastening to her cheerless shed, 
Breaks to her little ones untasted bread ; 
Clamorous as nesthng birds, the hungry band 
Receive a mortal portion at her hand : 
On each would equal love the best confer. 
Each by distinct affection dear to her ; 
One the first pledge that to her spouse she gave, 
And one unborn till he was in his grave ; 
This was his darling, that to her most kind ; 
A fifth was once a twin, the sixth is blind : 
In each she lives : — in each by turns she dies ; 
Smitten by pestilence before her eyes, 
Three days, and all are slain ; — the heaviest doom 
Is hers ; their ice-barr'd cottage is their tomb. 
— The wretch, whose limbs are impotent with cold, 
In the warm comfort of a mantle roll'd, 
Lies down to slumber on his soul's desire ; 
But wakes at morn, as wrapt in flames of fire : 
Not Hercules, when from his breast he tore 
The cloak envenom'd with the Centaur's gore, 
Felt sharper pangs than he, who, mad with rage. 
Dives in the gulf, or rolls in snow t' assuage 
His quenchless agony ; the rankling dart 
Within him burns till it consumes his heart. 
From vale to vale th' affrighted victims fly, 
But catch or give the plague with every sigh : 



GREENLAND. 



A touch contaminates the purest veins, 
Till the Black Death through all the region reigns. ' 
Comes there no ship again to Greenland's shore ? 
There comes another : — there shall come no more ; 
Nor this shall reach a haven : — What are these 
Stupendous monuments upon the seas ? 
Works of Omnipotence, in wondrous forms, 
Immovable as mountains in the storms ? 
Far as Imagination's eye can roll. 
One range of Alpine glaciers to the pole 
Flanks the whole eastern coast ; and, branching wide. 
Arches o'er many a league th' indignant tide, 
That works and frets, with unavailing flow, 
To mine a passage to the beach below ; 
Thence from its neck that winter yoke to rend. 
And down the gulf the crashing fragments send. 
There hes a vessel in this realm of frost. 
Not wreck'd, nor stranded, yet for ever lost ; 
Its keel embedded in the solid mass ; 
Its gUstening sails appear expanded glass ; 
The transverse ropes with pearls enormous strung ; 
The yards with icicles grotesquely hung. 
Wrapt in the topmost shrouds there rests a boy. 
His old sea-faring father's only joy ; 
Sprung from a race of rovers, ocean-born, 
Nursed at the helm, he trod dry land with scorn ; 
Through fourscore years from port to port he veer'dj 
Gluicksand, nor rock, nor foe, nor tempest fear'd ; 
Now cast ashore, though like a hulk he lie, 
His son at sea is ever in his eye. 
And his prophetic thought, from age to age. 
Esteems the waves his offspring's heritage ; 
He ne'er shall know, in his Norwegian cot, 
How brief that son's career, how strange his lot ; 
Writhed round the mast, and sepulchred in air. 
Him shall no worm devour, no vulture tear; 
Congeal'd to adamant, his frame shall last, 
Though empires change, till time and tide be past. 



J 




On deck, in groups embracing as they died, 
Singly, erect, or slumbering side by side. 
Behold the creAV ! — They sail'd, Avith hope elate. 
For eastern Greenland ; till, ensnared by fate. 
In toils that mock'd their utmost strength and skill. 
They felt, as by a charm, their ship stand still : 
The madness of the wildest gale that blows 
Were mercy to that shudder of repose, 
When withering horror struck from heart to heart 
The blunt rebound of Death's benumbing dart, 
And each, a petrifaction at his post, 
Look'd on yon father, and gave up the ghost ;* 
He, meekly kneehng, with his hands upraised, 
His beard of driven snoAv, eyes fix'd and glazed, 
Alone among the dead shall yet survive, 
— Th' imperishable dead, that seem alive ; 
— Th' immortal dead, Avhose spirits, breaking free, 
Bore his last words into eternity. 
While with a seraph's zeal, a Christian's love, 
Till his tongue fail'd, he spoke of joys above. 
Now motionless, amidst the icy air, 
He breathes from marble lips unutter'd prayer. 
The clouds coiidensed, with dark, unbroken hue 
Of stormy purple, overhang his view, 
Save in the west, to which he strains his sight, 
One golden streak, that grows intensely bright, 
Till thence th' emerging sun, with lightning blaze, 
Pours the whole quiver of his arrowy rays ; 
The smitten rocks to instant diamond turn, 
And round th' expiring saint such visions burn, 
As if the gates of Paradise were thrown 

Wide open to receive his soul ; 'tis flown. 

The glory vanishes, and over all 

Cimmerian darkness spreads her funeral pall. 

Morn shall return, and noon, and eve, and night 
Meet here with interchanging shade and light ; 
But from this bark no timber shall decay, 
Of these cold forms no feature pass away ; 



Perennial ice around th' incrusted bow, 

The peopled deck, and full-rigg'd masts shall grow. 

Till from the sun himself the whole be hid, 

Or spied beneath a cr3'stal pyramid ; 

As in pure amber, with divergent lines, 

A rugged shell emboss'd with sea-weed shines. 

From age to age increased with annual snow. 

This new Mont Blanc among the clouds may glow, 

Whose conic peak, that earliest greets the dawn, 

And latest from the sun's shut eye withdrawn. 

Shall from the zenith, through incumbent gloom, 

Burn like a lamp upon this naval tomb. 

But when th' archangel's trumpet sounds on high, 

The pile shall burst to atoms through the sky, 

AnS leave its dead, upstarting at the call, 

Naked and pale, before the Judge of aU. 

Once more to Greenland's long-forsaken beach. 
Which foot of man again shall never reach, 
Imagination wings her flight, explores 
The march of Pestilence along the shores, 
And sees how Famine in his steps hath paced, 
While Winter laid the soil for ever waste. 
Dwellings are heaps of fallen or falUng stones. 
The charnel-houses of unburied bones, 
On which obscene and prowling monsters fed. 
But with the ravin in their jaws fell dead. 
Thus while Destruction, blasting youth and age. 
Raged till it wanted victims for its rage ; 
Love, the last feeling that from life retires. 
Blew the faint sparks of his unfuell'd fires. 
In the cold sunshine of yon narrow deU 
Affection lingers ; — there two lovers dwell, 
Greenland's whole family ; nor long forlorn. 
There comes a visitant ; a babe is born. 
O'er his meek helplessness the parents smiled ; 
'Twas Hope ; — for Hope is every mother's child : 
Then seem'd they, in that world of solitude. 
The Eve and Adam of a race renew'd. 



GREENLAND. ' 



Brief happiness ! too perilous to last ; 
The moon hath wax'd and waned, and all is past ; 
Behold the end : — one morn, athwart the wall, 
They mark'd the shadow of a reindeer fall, 
Bounding in tameless freedom o'er the snow ; 
The father track'd him, and with fatal bow 
Smote down the victim ; but before his eyes, 
A rabid she-bear pounced upon the prize ; 
A shaft into the spoiler's flank he sent, 
She turn'd in wrath, and limb from limb had rent 
The hunter ; but his dagger's plunging steel, 
With riven bosom, made the monster reel : 
Unvanquish'd, both to closer combat flew, 
Assailants each, till each the other slew ; 
Mingling their blood from mutual wounds, they lay 
Stretch'd on the carcass of their antler'd prey. 

Meanwhile his partner waits, her heart at rest, 
No burden but her infant on her breast : 
With him she slumbers, or with him she plays, 
And tells him all her dreams of future days ; 
Asks him a thousand questions, feigns replies, 
And reads whate'er she wishes in his eyes. 
— Red evening comes ; no husband's shadow falls. 
Where fell the reindeer's o'er the latticed walls : 
'Tis night ; no footstep sounds towards her door ; 
The day returns, — but he returns no more. 
In frenzy forth she sallies ; and with cries. 
To which no voice except her own replies 
In frightful echoes, startling all around. 
Where human voice again shall never sound, 
She seeks him, finds him not ; some angel-guide 
In mercy turns her from the corpse aside ; 
Perhaps his own freed spirit, lingering near, 
Who waits to waft her to a happier sphere, 
But leads her first, at evening, to their cot 
Where lies the httle one, all day forgot ; 
Imparadised in sleep she finds him there. 
Kisses his cheek, and breathes a mother's prayer. 



Three days she languishes, nor can she shed 

One tear, between the living and the dead ; 

When her lost spouse comes o'er the widow's thought, 

The pangs of memory are to madness wrought ; 

But when her suckhng's eager lips are felt. 

Her heart would fain — but oh ! it cannot melt ; 

At length it breaks, while on her lap he lies, 

With baby wonder gazing in her eyes. 

Poor orphan ! mine is not a hand to trace 

Thy httle story, last of all thy race ! 

Not long thy sufferings ; cold and colder grown. 

The arms that clasp thee chill thy limbs to stone. 

— 'Tis done : — from Greenland's coast, the latest sigh 

Bore infant innocence beyond the sky. 




THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



CANTO FIRST. 



Methought I lived through ages, and beheld 

Their generations pass so swiftly by me, 

That years were moments in their flight, and hours 

The scenes of crowded centuries reveal'd ; 

While Time, Life, Death, the world's great actors, wrought 

NeAv and amazing changes : — these I sing. 

Sky, sun, and sea were all the universe ; 
The sky, one blue, interminable arch. 
Without a breeze, a wing, a cloud : the sun 
Sole in the firmament, but in the deep 
Redoubled ; where the circle of the sea, 
Invisible with cahnness, seem'd to lie 
Within the hollow of a lower heaven. 

I was a Spirit in the midst of these, 
All eye, ear, thought ; existence was enjoyment ; 
Light was an element of life, and air 
The clothing of my incorporeal form, — 
A form impalpable to mortal touch, 
And volatile as fragrance from the flower, 
Or music in the woodlands. What the soul 
Can make itself at pleasure, that I was ; 
A child in feeling and imagination, 
Learning new lessons still, as Nature wrought 
Her Avonders in my presence. All I saw 
(Like Adam when he walk'd in Paradise) 
I knew and named by secret intuition. 
Actor, spectator, sufferer, each in turn, 
I ranged, explored, reflected. Now I sail'd. 
And now I soar'd ; anon expanding, seem'd 




Diffused into immensity, yet bound 

Within a space too narrow for desire ; 

The mind, the mind perpetual themes must task. 

Perpetual power impel, and hope allure. 

I and the silent sun were here alone, 

But not companions ; high and bright he held 

His course ; I gazed with admiration on him, — 

There all communion ended ; and I sigh'd. 

In loneliness imutterable sigh'd. 

To feel myself a wanderer without aim. 

An exile amidst splendid desolation, 

A prisoner with infinity surrounded. 

The sun descended, dipp'd, and disappear'd ; 
Then sky and sea were all the universe. 
And I the only being in existence ! 
So thought I, and the thought, like ice and fire, 
Went freezing, burning, withering, thrilling through me 
Annihilation then had been dehverance. 
While that eternity of solitude 
Lay on my heart, hard struggling to break free, 
As from a dream, when mountains press the sleeper. 

Darkness, meanwhile, disguised in twilight, crept 
O'er air and ocean ; drearier gloom involved 
My fainting senses, till a sudden ray 
Of pensile lustre sparkled from the west ; 
I flew to meet it, but dreAV never nearer, 
While, vanishing and re-appearing oft. 
At length it trembled out into a star. 
My soul revived, and could I then have wept, 
(Methought I did,) with tears of fond delight. 
How had I hail'd the gentle apparition. 
As second life to me ; so sweetly welcome 
The faintest semblance of society, 
Though but a point to rest the eye upon. 
To him who hath been utterly bereaved ! 
— Star after star, from some unseen abyss. 
Came through the sky, hke thoughts into the mind. 
We know not whence ; till all the firmament 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



Was throng'd with constellations, and the sea 

Strown with their images. Amidst a sphere 

Of twinkhng lights, like living eyes, that look'd 

At once on me from every side, I stood, 

(Motion and rest Avith me were mere volition,) 

Myself perhaps a star among the rest ! 

But here again I found no fellowship ; 

Sight could not reach, nor keenest thought conceive 

Their nature or their offices. To me 

They were but what they seem'd, and yet I felt 

They must be more ; the mind hath no horizon. 

It looks beyond the eye, and seeks for mind 

In all it sees, or all it sees o'erruUng. 

LoAV in the east, ere long, the morning dawn 
Shot upward, onward, and around the pole, 
With arrowy glimpses traversing the shade. 
Night's train, as they had kindled one by one, 
Now one by one withdrew, reversing order. 
Where those that came the latest, earliest went: 
Day rose triumphant, and again to me 
Sky, sun, and sea were all the universe ; 
But ah ! the glory had departed, and I long'd 
For some untried vicissitude : — it came. 

A breeze sprang up, and with careering wing 
Play'd like an unseen being on the water. 
Slowly from slumber 'woke the unwilling main, 
Curhng and murmuring, till the infant waves 
Leap'd on his lap, and laugh'd in air and sunshine. 
Then all was bright and beautiful emotion, 
And sweet accordance of susurrant sounds. 
I felt the gay delirium of the scene ; 
I felt the breeze and billow chase each other, 
Like bounding pulses in my human veins : 
For, though impassive to the elements, 
The form I wore was exquisitely tuned 
To Nature's sympathies ; joy, fear, hope, sorrow, 
(As though I yet were in the body,) moved. 
Elated, shook, or tranquillized my soul. 



Thus pass'd the day : night followed, deck'd with stars 
Innumerable, and the pale new moon, 
Beneath her feet, a slight inverted crescent. 
Soon disappearing. 

Time flew on, and brought 
Alternate morn and eve. The sun, the stars, 
The moon through all her phases, waxing, Avaning, 
The planets seeking rest, and finding none, 
— These were the only objects in mine eye. 
The constant burden of my thoughts, perplex'd 
With vain conjectures why they were created. 

Once, at high noon, amidst a sultry calm. 
Looking around for comfort, I descried, 
Far on the green horizon's utmost verge, 
A wreath of cloud ; to me a glad discovery. 
For each new image sprang a new idea. 
The germ of thoughts to come, that could not die. 
The little vapour rapidly expanded. 
Lowering and thickenin^r till it hid the sun, 
And threw a starless night upon the sea. 
Eagerly, tremblingly, I watch'd the end. 
Faint gleam'd the lightning, follov»r'd by no peal ; 
Dreary and hollow moans foretold a gale ; 
Nor long the issue tarried ; then the Avind, 
Unprison'd, blew its trumpet loud and shrill ; 
Out flash'd the lightnings gloriously ; the rain 
Came down like music, and the full-toned thunder 
Roll'd in grand harmony throughout high heaven : 
Till ocean, breaking from his black supineness, 
Drown'd in his own stupendous uproar all 
The voices of the storm beside ; meanwhile 
A war of mountains raged upon the surface ; 
Mountains each other swallowing, and again 
New Alps and Andes, from unfathom'd valleys 
Upstarting, join'd the battle ; like those sons 
Of earth, — Giants, rebounding as new-born 
From every fall on their unwearied mother. 
I glow'd with all the rapture of the strife : 



Beneath was one wild whirl of foaming surges ; 

Above, the array of lightnings, like the swords 

Of cherubim, wide-brandish'd, to repel 

Aggression from heaven's gates ; their flaming strokes 

Gluench'd momentarily in the vast abyss. 

The voice of Him who walks upon the wind, 
And sets his throne upon the floods, rebuked 
The headlong tempest in its mid-career, 
And turn'd its horrors to magnificence. 
The evening sun broke through the embattled clouds, 
And threw round sky and sea, as by enchantment, 
A radiant girdle, binding them to peace. 
In the full rainbow's harmony of beams ; 
No brilhant fragment, but one sevenfold circle. 
That spann'd the horizon, meted out the heavens. 
And underarch'd the ocean. 'Twas a scene, 
That left itself for ever on my mind. 

Night, silent, cool, transparent, crown'd the day ; 
The sky receded further into space. 
The stars came lower down to meet the eye, 
Till the whole hemisphere, alive with hght, 
Twinkled from east to west by one consent. 
The constellations round the arctic pole, 
That never set to us, here scarcely rose. 
But in their stead, Orion through the north 
Pursued the Pleiads ; Sirius, Avith his keen, 
Q,uick scintillations, in the zenith reign'd. 
The south unveil'd its glories ; — there the Wolf, 
With eyes of lightning, Avatch'd the Centaur's spear ; 
Through the clear hyaline, the Ship of Heaven 
Came saihng from eternity ; the Dove, 
On silver pinions, wing'd her peaceful way ; 
There, at the footstool of Jehovah's throne, 
The Altar, kindled from His presence, blazed ; 
There, too, all else exceUing, meekly shone 
The Cross, the symbol of redeeming love : 
The Heavens declared the glorj^ of the Lord, 
The firmament display'd his handiwork. 




With scarce inferior lustre gleam'd the sea, 
Whose waves were spangled with phosphoric fire, 
As though the lightnings there had spent their shafts, 
And left the fragments glittering on the field. 

Next morn, in mockery of a storm, the breeze 
And waters skirmish'd ; bubble-armies fought 
Millions of battles on the crested surges. 
And where they fell, all cover'd with their glory. 
Traced, in white foam on the cerulean main, 
Paths, like the milky-way among the stars. 
Charm'd with the spectacle, yet deeply touch'd 
With a forlorn and not untender feeling — 
" Why," said my thoughts within me, " why this waste 
Of lovehness and grandeur unenjoy'd ? 
Is there no life throughout this fair existence ? 
Sky, sun, and sea, the moon, the stars, the clouds. 
Wind, lightning, thunder, are but ministers ; 
They know not what they are, nor what they do : 
Oh for the beings for whom these were made !" 

Light as a flake of foam upon the wind, 
Keel upward from the deep emerged a shell, 
Shaped hke the moon ere half her horn is filled ; 
Fraught with young life, it righted as it rose, 
And moved at will along the yielding water. 
The native pilot of this little bark 
Put out a tier of oars on either side. 
Spread to the wafting breeze a twofold sail, 
And mounted up and glided down the billow 
In happy freedom, pleased to feel the air, 
And wander in the luxury of hght. 
Worth all the dead creation in that hour, 
To me appeared this lonely Nautilus, 
My fellow-being, like myself alive. 
Entranced in contemplation vague yet sweet, 
I watch'd its vagrant course and rippling wake, 
Till I forgot the sun amidst the heavens. 

It closed, sunk, dwindled to a point, then nothing ; 
While the last bubble crown'd the dimpling eddy. 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



Through which mine eye still giddily pursued it, 
A joyous creature vaulted through the air, — 
The aspiring fish that fain would be a bird, 
On long, light wings, that flung a diamond shower 
Of dew-drops round its evanescent form. 
Sprang into light, and instantly descended. 
Ere I could greet the stranger as a friend, 
Or mourn his quick departure, — on the surge, 
A shoal of Dolphins, tumbhng in Avild glee, 
Glow'd with such orient tints, they might have been 
The rainbow's offspring, when it met the ocean 
In that resplendent vision I had seen. 
While yet in ecstasy I hung o'er these. 
With every motion pouring out fresh beauties. 
As though the conscious colours came and went 
At pleasure, glorjdng in their subtle changes, — 
Enormous o'er the flood, Leviathan 
Look'd forth, and from his roaring nostrils sent 
Two fountains to the sky, then plunged amain 
In headlong pastime through the closing gulf. 

These were but preludes to the revelry 
That reign'd at sunset : then the deep let loose 
Its blithe adventurers to sport at large, 
As kindly instinct taught them ; buoyant shells, 
On stormless voyages, in fleets or single, 
Wherried their tiny mariners ; aloof. 
On wing-like fins, in bow-and-arrow figures. 
The flying fishes darted to and fro ; 
While spouting Whales projected watery columns, 
That turn'd to arches at their height, and seem'd 
The skeletons of crystal palaces. 
Built on the blue expanse, then perishing. 
Frail as the element which they were made of: 
Dolphins, in gambols, lent the lucid brine 
Hues richer than the canopy of eve. 
That overhung the scene with gorgeous clouds, 
Decaying into gloom more beautiful 
Than the sun's golden liveries which they lost : 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



Till light that hides, and darkness that reveals 
The stars, — exchanging guard, like sentinels 
Of day and night, — transform'd the face of nature 
Above was w^akefulness, silence around, 
Beneath repose, — repose that reach'd even me. 
Power, will, sensation, memory, fail'd in turn ; 
My very essence seem'd to pass away, 
Like a thin cloud that melts across the moon. 
Lost in the blue immensity of heaven. 



CANTO SECOND. 



Life's intermitting pulse again went on : 

I woke amidst the beauty of a morn. 

That shone as bright within me as around. 

The presence-chamber of the soul was full 

Of flitting images and rapturous thoughts ; 

For mind and eye were open'd to explore 

The secrets of the abyss erewhile conceal'd. 

The floor of ocean, never trod by man, 

Was visible to me as heaven's round roof. 

Which man hath never touch'd ; the multitude 

Of living things in that new hemisphere, 

Gleam'd out of darkness, like the stars at midnight, 

When moon nor clouds, Avith light or shade, obscure them. 

For, as in hollows of the tide-worn reef, 

Left at low water glistening in the sun, 

Pellucid pools and rocks in miniature. 

With their small fry of fishes, crusted shells. 

Rich mosses, tree-like sea-weed, sparkling pebbles. 

Enchant the eye, and tempt the eager hand 

To violate the fairy paradise, 

— So to my view the deep disclosed its wonders. 

In the free element beneath me swam, 
Flounder'd, and dived, in play, in chase, in battle. 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



Fishes of every colour, form, and kind, 
(Strange forms, resplendent colours, kinds unnumber'd,) 
Which language cannot paint, and mariner 
Hath never seen ; from dread Leviathan 
To insect millions peopling every wave ; 
And nameless tribes, half-plant, half-animal, 
Rooted and slumbering through a* dream of life. 
The livelier inmates to the surface sprang. 
To taste the freshness of heaven's breath, and feel 
That light is pleasant, and the sunbeam warm. 
Most in the middle region sought their prey. 
Safety, or pastime ; solitary some. 
And some in pairs affectionately join'd ; 
Others in shoals immense, like floating islands. 
Led by mysterious instinct through that waste 
And trackless region, though on every side 
Assaulted by voracious enemies, 

— Whales, sharks, and monsters, arm'd in front or jaw, 
With swords, saws, spiral horns, or hooked fangs. 
While ravening ^Death of slaughter ne'er grew weary, 
Life multiplied the immortal meal as fast. 
War, reckless, universal war, prevail'd ; 
All Avere devourers, all in turn devour'd ; 
Yet every unit in the uncounted sum 
Of victims had its share of bliss, its pang. 
And but a pang, of dissolution; each 
Was happy till its moment came, and then 
Its first, last suffering, unforeseen, unfear'd, 
Closed, with one struggle, pain and life for ever. 
So He ordain'd, whose way is in the sea, 
His path amidst great waters, and his steps 
Unknown ; — whose judgments are a mighty deep. 
Where plummet of Archangel's intellect 
Could never yet find soundings, but from age 
To age let down, draAvn up, then thrown again. 
With lengthen'd line and added weight, still fails ; 
And still the cry in Heaven is, " Oh the depth!" 
Thus, while bewilder'd with delight I gazed 



u 



THE I'ELICAN ISLAND. 



On life in CA^ery shape it here assumed, 

Congenial feeling made me follow it, 

And try to be whatever I beheld ; 

By mental transmigration thus I pass'd 

Through many a body, and in each essay 'd 

New instincts, powers, enjoj^ments, death itself; 

Till, weary with the fanciful pursuit, 

I started from that idle reverie. 

Then grew my heart more desolate than ever ; 

Here had I found the beings which I sought, 

— Beings for whom the universe was made, 

Yet none of kindred with myself. In vain 

I strove to waken sympathy in breasts 

Cold as the element in which they moved. 

And inaccessible to fellowship 

With me, as sun and stars, as winds and vapours : 

Sense had they, but no more ; mind was not there. 

They roam'd, they fed, they slept, they died, and left 

Race after race, to roam, feed, sleep, then die, 

And leave their like through endless generations ; 

— Incessant change of actors, none of scene. 

Through all that boundless theatre of strife ! 

Shrinking into myself again, I cried, 

In bitter disappointment, — " Is this all ?" 

I sent a glance at random from the cloud. 
In which I then lay floating through mid-heaven. 
To ocean's innermost recess ; — when, lo ! 
Another seal of Nature's book was open'd. 
Which lield transported thought so deep entranced, 
That Time, though borne through mightiest revolutions, 
Seem'd, hke the earth in motion, to stand still. 
The works of ages grew beneath mine eye ; 
As rapid intellect calls up events. 
Combines, compresses, moulds them, with such power. 
That, in a Uttle page of memory. 
An empire's annals lie, — a nation's fortunes 
Pass in review, as motes through sunbeams pass, 
Glistening and vanishing in quick succession. 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



Yet each distinct as though there were but one ; 

— So thrice a thousand years, with all their issues, 

Hurried before me, through a gleam of Time, 

Between the clouds of two eternities, — 

That whence they came, and that to which tliey tended. 

Immeasurable continents beneath 
The expanse of animated waters lay, 
Not stroAvn, — as I have since discern'd the tracks 
Of voyagers, — with shipwrecks and their spoils, 
The wealth of merchants, the artillery 
Of war, the chains of captives, and the gems 
That glow'd upon the brow of beauty ; crowns 
Of monarchs, swords of heroes, anchors lost. 
That never had let go their hold in storms ; 
Helms, sunk in ports, that steer'd adventurous barks 
Round the wide world ; bones of dead men, that made 
A hidden Golgotha where they had fallen, 
Unseen, imsepulchred, but not unwept 
By lover, friend, relation, far away, 
L/ong waiting their return to home and country. 
And going down into their fathers' graves 
With their gray hairs or youthful locks in sorrow, 
To meet no more till seas give up their dead : 
Some too — ay thousands — whom none living mourn'd. 
None miss'd, — waifs in the universe, the last, 
Lorn links of kindred chains for ever sunder'd. 

Not such the spectacle I now survey'd : 
No broken hearts lay here ; no aching heads, 
For whose vast schemes the world was once too small, 
And life too short, in Death's dark lap found rest 
Beneath the unresting wave ; — but skeletons 
Of whales and krakens here and there Avere scatter'd, 
The prey when dead of tribes, their prey when living : 
And, seen by glimpses, but awakening thoughts 
Too sad for utterance, — relics huge and strange 
Of the old world that perish'd by the flood. 
Kept under chains of darkness till the judgment. 
— Save these, lay ocean's bed, as from the hand 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



V. 



Of its Creator, holiow'd and prepared 
For his unfathomable counsels there, 
To work slow miracles of power divine, 
From century to century, — nor less 
Incomprehensible than heaven and earth 
Form'd in six days by His commanding word. 
With God a thousand years are as one day ; 
He in one day can sum a thousand years : 
All acts with Him are equal ; for no more 
It costs Omnipotence to build a world, 
And set a sun amidst the firmament. 
Than mould a dew-drop, and light up its gem. 

This was the landscape stretch'd beneath the flood : 
— Rocks, branching out like chains of Alpine mountains 
Gulfs intervening, sandy wildernesses. 
Forests of growth enormous, caverns, shoals ; 
Fountains upspringing, hot and cold, and fresh 
And bitter, as on land ; volcanic fires 
Fiercely out-flashing from earth's central heart. 
Nor soon extinguish'd by the rush of waters 
Down the rent crater to the unknown abyss 
Of Nature's laboratory, where she hides 
Her deeds from every eye except her Maker's : 
— Such Avere the scenes which ocean open'd to me ; 
Mysterious regions, the recluse abode 
Of unapproachable inhabitants, 
That dwelt in everlasting darkness there. 
Unheard by them the roaring of the wind, 
The elastic motion of the wave unfelt ; 
Still life was theirs, well pleasing to themselves, 
Nor yet unuseful, as my song sliall show. 

Here, on a stony eminence, that stood. 
Girt with inferior ridges, at the point, 
Where light and darkness meet in spectral gloom, 
Midway between the height and depth of ocean, 
I mark'd a whirlpool in perpetual play, 
As though the mountain were itself alive, 
And catching prey on every side, with feelers 



THE PELICAN ISLAND 



Countless as sunbeams, slight as gossamer ; 

Ere long transfigured, each fine film became 

An independent creature, self-employ'd, ^ 

Yet but an agent in one common work, 

The sum of all their individual labours. 

Shapeless they seem'd, but endless shapes assumed ; 

Elongated like worms, they writhed and shrunk 

Their tortuous bodies to grotesque dimensions ; 

Compress'd hke wedges, radiated like stars, 

Branching like sea-weed, whirl'd in dazzhng rings ; ^ 

Subtle and variable as flickering flames, 

Sight could not trace their evanescent changes, 

Nor comprehend their motions, till minute 

And curious observations caught the clew 

To this hve labyrinth, — where every one, 

By instinct taught, perform'd its little task ; 

— To build its dwelling and its sepulchre. 

From its own essence exquisitely modell'd ; "^ 

There breed, and die, and leave a progeny, 

Still multiphed beyond the reach of numbers, 

To frame new cells and tombs ; then breed and die ^ 

As all their ancestors had done, — and rest, 

Hermetically seal'd, each in its shrine, 

A statue in this temple of oblivion ! 

Millions of millions thus, from age to age, 

With simplest skill, and toil unweariable. 

No moment and no movement unimproved, 

Laid line on line, on terrace terrace spread, 

To swell the heightening, brightening gradual mound, 

By marvellous structure climbing tow'rds the day. 

Each wrought alone, yet all together wrought. 

Unconscious, not unworthy instruments. 

By which a hand invisible was rearing 

A new creation in the secret deep. 

Omnipotence wrought in them, with them, by them ; 

Hence what Omnipotence alone could do 

Worms did. I saw the Hving pile ascend. 

The mausoleum of its architects, 



Still dying upwards as their labours closed : 

Slime the material, but the sHme was turn'd 

To adamant, by their petrific touch ; 

Frail were their frames, ephemeral their lives, 

Their masonry imperishable. All 

Life's needful functions, food, exertion, rest. 

By nice economy of Providence 

Were overruled to carry on the process, 

Which out of water brought forth soUd rock. 

Atom by atom thus the burden grew, 
Even like an infant in the womb, till Time 
Deliver'd ocean of that monstrous birth, 
— A coral island, stretching east and west. 
In God's own language to its parent saying, 
" Thus far, nor farther, shalt thou go ; and here 
Shall thy proud waves be stay'd :" — A point at first 
It peer'd above those waves ; a point so small, 
I just perceived it, fix'd where all was floating ; 
And when a bubble cross'd it, the blue film 
Expanded hke a sky above the speck ; 
That speck became a hand-breadth ; day and night 
It spread, accumulated, and ere long 
Presented to my view a dazzUng plain, 
White as the moon amid the sapphire sea ; 
Bare at low water, and as still as death, 
But when the tide came gurgling o'er the surface, 
'Twas like a resurrection of the dead : 
From graves innumerable, punctures fine 
In the close coral, capillary swarms 
Of reptiles, horrent as Medusa's snakes, 
Cover'd the bald-pate reef; then all was life, 
And indefatigable industry ; 
The artisans were twisting to and fro, 
In idle-seeming convolutions ; yet 
They never vanish'd with the ebbing surge, 
Till pelHcle on pellicle, and layer 
On layer, was added to the gi'owing mass. 
Ere long the reef o'ertopt the spring-flood's height. 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 

And mock'd the billows when they leapt upon it, 
Unable to maintain their slippery hold, 
And falling down in foam-wreaths round its verge. 
Steep were the flanks, with precipices sharp, 
Descending to their base in ocean-gloom. 
Chasms few, and narrow, and irregular, 
Form'd harbours, safe at once and perilous, — 
Safe for defence, but perilous to enter. 
A sea-lake shone amid the fossil isle. 
Reflecting in a ring its cliffs and caverns. 
With heaven itself seen like a lake below. 

Compared with this amazing edifice. 
Raised by the weakest creatures in existence. 
What are the works of intellectual man ? 
Towers, temples, palaces, and sepulchres ; 
Ideal images in sculptured forms. 
Thoughts hewn in columns, or in domes expanded, 
Fancies through ever};" maze of beauty shown ; 
Pride, gratitude, affection, turn'd to marble. 
In honour of the living or the dead ; 
What are they ? — fine-wrought miniatures of art. 
Too exquisite to bear the weight of dew. 
Which every morn lets fall in pearls upon them. 
Till all their pomp sinks down in mouldering rehcs. 
Yet in their ruin lovelier than their prime ! 
— Dust in the balance, atoms in the gale. 
Compared with these achievements in the deep, 
Were all the monuments of olden time, 
In days when there were giants on the earth : 
— Babel's stupendous folly, though it aim'd 
To scale heaven's battlements, was but a toy. 
The plaything of the world in infancy : — 
The ramparts, towers, and gates of Babylon, 
Built for eternity, — though, where they stood. 
Ruin itself stands still for lack of work. 
And Desolation keeps unbroken sabbath ; — 
Great Babylon, in its full moon of empire. 
Even when its " head of gold" was smitten off'. 



u 



And from a monarch changed into a brute ; — 

Great Babylon was Hke a wreath of sand, 

Left by one tide, and cancell'd by the next : — 

Egypt's dread wonders, still defying Time, 

Where cities have been crumbled into sand. 

Scatter'd by winds beyond the Libyan desert, 

Or melted down into the mud of Nile, 

And cast in tillage o'er the corn-sown fields. 

Where Memphis fiourish'd, and the Pharaohs reigia d 

^SyP^'^ S^'^Y piles of hieroglyphic grandeur, 

That have survived the language which they speak, 

Preserving its dead emblems to the eye. 

Yet hiding from the mind what these reveal ; 

— Her pyramids would be mere pinnacles. 

Her giant statues, wrought from blocks of granite, 

But puny ornaments for such a pile 

As this stupendous mound of catacombs, 

Fill'd with dry mummies of the builder-worms. 

Thus far, with undiverted thought, and eye 
Intensely fix'd on ocean's concave mirror, 
I watch'd the process to its finishing stroke : 
Then starting suddenly, as from a trance. 
Once more to look upon the blessed sun. 
And breathe the gladdening influence of the wind. 
Darkness fell on me ; giddily my brain 
Whirl'd like a torch of fire that seems a circle, 
And soon to me the universe was nothing. 




CANTO THIRD. 

Nine times the age of man that coral reef 

Had bleach'd beneath the torrid noon, and borne 

The thunder of a thousand hurricanes, 

Raised by the jealous ocean, to repel 

That strange encroachment on his old domain. 

His rage was impotent ; his wrath fulfill'd 

The counsels of eternal Providence, 

And 'stablish'd what he strove to overturn : 

For every tempest threw fresh wrecks upon it ; 

Sand from the shoals, exuviag from the deep. 

Fragments of shells, dead sloughs, sea-monsters' bones, 

Whales stranded in the shallows, hideous weeds 

Hurl'd out of darkness by the uprooting surges ; 

These, with unutterable relics more, 

Heap'd the rough surface, till the various mass, 

By Nature's chemistry combined and purged, 

Had buried the bare rock in crumbling mould, 

Not unproductive, but from time to time 

Impregnated with seeds of plants, and rife 

With embryo animals, or torpid forms 

Of reptiles, shrouded in the clefts of trees, 

From distant lands, with branches, foliage, fruit, 

Pluck'd up and wafted hither by the flood. 

Death's spoils, and hfe's hid treasures, thus enrich'd 

And colonized the soil ; no particle 

Of meanest substance but in course was turn'd 

To solid use or noble ornament. 

All seasons were propitious ; every wind, 

From the hot Siroc to the wet Monsoon, 

Temper'd the crude materials ; while heaven's dew 

Fell on the sterile wilderness as sweetly 

As though it were a garden of the Lord ; 

Nor fell in vain ; each drop had its commission, 

And did its duty, known to Him who sent it. 



Such timo had past, such changes liad transfigured 
The aspect of that solitary isle, 
When I again in spirit, as before, 
Assumed mute watch above it. Slender blades 
Of grass were shooting through the dark brown earth, 
Like rays of light, transparent in the sun, 
Or after showers with liquid gems illumined ; 
Fountains through filtering sluices sallied forth, 
And led fertility where'er they turn'd ; 
Green herbage graced their banks, resplendent flowers 
Unlock'd their treasures, and let flow their fragrance. 
Then insect legions, prank'd with gaudiest hues, 
Pearl, gold, and purple, swarm'd into existence ; 
Minute and marvellous creations these ! 
Infinite multitudes on every leaf, 
In every drop, by me discern'd at pleasure. 
Were yet too fine for unenlighten'd eye, 
— Like stars, whose beams have never reach'd our world. 
Though science meets them midway in the heaven 
With prying optics, weighs them in her scale. 
Measures their orbs, and calculates their courses : — 
Some barely visible, some proudly shone. 
Like living jewels ; some grotesque, uncouth. 
And hideous, — giants of a race of pigmies ; 
These burrow'd in the ground, and fed on garbage. 
Those lived deliciously on honey-dews. 
And dwelt in palaces of blossom'd bells ; 
Millions on millions, wing'd, and plumed in front, 
And arm'd with stings for vengeance or assault, 
Fill'd the dim atmosphere with hum and hurry ; 
Children of light, and air, and fire they seem'd, 
Their lives all ecstasy and quick, cross motion. 
Thus throve this embryo universe, where all 
That was to be was unbegun, or now 
Beginning ; every day, hour, instant, brought 
Its novelty, though how or whence I knew not ; 
Less than omniscience could not comprehend 
The causes of effects that seem'd spontaneous. 




And sprang in infinite succession, link'd 

With kindred issues infinite as they, 

For which almighty skill had laid the train 

Even in the elements of chaos, — whence 

The unravelling clew not for a moment lost 

Hold of the silent hand that drcAv it out. 

Thus He who makes and peoples worlds still works 

In secrecy, behind a veil of hght ; 

Yet through that hiding of his power, such glimpses 

Of glory break as strike presumption blind, 

But humble and exalt the humbled soul, 

Whose faith the things invisible discerns. 

And God informing, guiding, ruling all : — 

He speaks, 'tis done ; commands, and it stands fast. 

He calls an island from the deep, — it comes ; 

Ordains it culture, — soil and seed are there ; 

Appoints inhabitants, — from climes unknown, 

By vmdiscoverable paths, they flock 

Thither ; — like passage-birds to us in spring ; 

They were not yesterday, — and lo ! to-day 

They are, — but what keen eye beheld them coming ? 

Here was the infancy of life, the age 
Of gold in that green isle, itself new-born, 
And all upon it in the prime of being, 
Love, hope, and promise ; 'twas in miniature 
A world unsoil'd by sin ; a Paradise 
Where Death had not yet entered : Bliss had newly 
Ahghted, and shut close his rainbow wings, 
To rest at ease, nor dread intruding ill. 
Plants of superior growth now sprang apace. 
With moon-like blossoms crown'd, or starry glories ; 
Light, flexile shrubs among the greenwood play'd 
Fantastic freaks, — they crept, thej^ climb'd, they budded. 
And hung their flowers and berries in the sun ; 
As the breeze taught, they danced, they sung, they twined 
Their sprays in bowers, or spread the ground with netAvork. 
Through the slow lapse of undivided time. 
Silently rising from their buried germs. 



Trees lifted to the skies their stately heads, 

Tufted with verdure, like depending plumag-e. 

O'er stems unknotted, wavino- to the wind ; 

Of these in graceful form, and simple heauty, 

The fruitful cocoa and the fragrant palm 

Exceird the wilding daughters of the wood, 

That stretch'd unwieldy their enormous arms. 

Clad with luxuriant foliage, from the trunk, 

Like the old eagle, feather'd to the heel ; 

While every fibre, from the lowest root 

To the last leaf upon the topmost twig, 

Was held by common sympathy, diffusing 

Through all the complex frame unconscious life. 

Such was the locust, with his hydra boughs, 

A hundred heads on one stupendous trunk ; 

And such the mangrove, which, at full-moon flood, 

Appear'd itself a wood upon the waters. 

But when the tide left bare its upright roots, 

A wood on piles suspended in the air ; 

Such too the Indian fig, that built itself 

Into a sylvan temple, arch'd aloof 

With airy aisles and living colonnades. 

Where nations might have w^orshipp'd God in peace. 

From year to year their fruits ungather'd fell ; 

Not lost, but quickening where they lay, they struck 

Root downward, and brake forth on every hand, 

Till the strong saplings, rank and file, stood up, 

A mighty army, which o'erran the isle, 

And changed the wilderness into a forest. 

All this appear'd accompHsh'd in the space 
Between the morning and the evening star : 
So, in liis third day's work, Jehovah spake, 
And Earth, an infant, naked as she came 
Out of the womb of chaos, straight put on 
Her beautiful attire, and dock'd her robe 
Of verdure with ten thousand glorious flowers. 
Exhaling incense ; crown'd her mountain-heads 
With cedars, train'd her vines around their girdles. 



And pour'd spontaneous harvests at their feet. 

Nor were those woods without inhabitants 
Besides the ephemera of earth and air ; 
— Where ghd the sunbeams through the latticed boughs, 
And fell Uke dew-drops on the spangled ground, 
To hght the diamond beetle on his way ; 
— Where cheerful openings let the sky look down 
Into the very heart of soHtude, 
On little garden-plots of social flowers, 
That crowded from the shades to peep at daylight ; 
— Or where impermeable foliage made 
Midnight at noon, and chill, damp horror reign'd 
O'er dead, fall'n leaves and slimy funguses ; 
— Reptiles were quicken'd into various birth. 
Loathsome, unsightly, swoln to obscene bulk, 
Lurk'd the dark toad beneath the infected turf; 
The slow-worm crawl'd, the light cameleon climb'd, 
And changed his colour as his place he changed ; 
The nimble lizard ran from bough to bough. 
Glancing through light, in shadow disappearing ; * 
The scorpion, many-eyed, with sting of fire, 
Bred there, — the legion-fiend of creeping things, 
Terribly beautiful, the serpent lay, 
Wreath'd hke a coronet of gold and jeAvels, 
Fit for a tyrant's brow ; anon he flew 
Straight as an arrow shot from his own rings, 
And struck his victim, shrieking ere it went 
Down his strain'd throat, that open sepulchre. 

Amphibious monsters haunted the lagoon ; 
The hippopotamus, amidst the flood, 
Flexile and active as the smallest swimmer ; 
But on the bank, ill-balanced and infirm, 
He grazed the herbage, with huge head dechned. 
Or lean'd to rest against some ancient tree. 
The crocodile, the dragon of the waters. 
In iron panoply, fell as the plague. 
And merciless as famine, cranch'd his prey, 
While from his jav/s, with dreadful fangs all serried. 




The life-blood dyed the waves Avilh deadly streams. 
The seal and the sea-lion, from the gulf, 
Came forth, and couching with their httle ones, 
Slept on the shelving rocks that girt the shore, 
Securing prompt retreat from sudden danger : 
The pregnant turtle, stealing out at eve, 
With anxious eye, and trembling heart, explored 
The lonehest coves, and in the loose, warm sand 
Deposited her eggs, which the sun hatch'd : 
Hence the young brood, that never knew a parent, 
Unburrow'd and by instinct sought the sea ; 
Nature herself, with her own gentle hand. 
Dropping them one by one into the flood, 
And laughing to behold their antic joy, 
AVhen launch'd in their maternal element. 

The vision of that brooding world went on; 
MilHons of beings yet more admirable 
Than all that went before them now appcar'd ; 
Flocking from every point of heaven, and fdhng 
Eye, ear, and mind with objects, sounds, emotions 
Akin to hveher sympathy and love 
Than reptiles, fishes, insects, could inspire. 
— Birds, the free tenants of land, air, and ocean, 
Their forms all symmetry, their motions grace ; 
In plumage, delicate and beautiful. 
Thick without burden, close as fishes' scales. 
Or loose as full-blown poppies to the breeze ; 
With wings that might have had a soul within them, 
They bore their owners by such sweet enchantment ; 
— Birds, small and great, of endless shapes and colours, 
Here flew and perch'd, there swam and dived at pleasure 
Watchful and agile, uttering voices wild 
And harsh, yet in accordance with the waves 
Upon the beach, the winds in caverns moaning, 
Or winds and waves abroad upon the water. 
Some sought their food among the finny shoals. 
Swift darting from the clouds, emerging soon 
With slender captives glittering in their beaks ; 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



These in recesses of steep crags constructed 

Their eyries inaccessible, and train'd 

Their hardy broods to forage in all weathers ; 

Others, more gorgeously apparell'd, dwelt 

Among the woods, on Nature's dainties feeding, 

Herbs, seeds, and roots ; or, ever on the wing. 

Pursuing insects through the boundless air : 

In hollow trees or thickets these conceal'd 

Their exquisitely woven nests ; where lay 

Their callow offspring, quiet as the down 

On their own breasts, till from her search the dam 

With laden bill return'd, and shared the meal 

Among her clamorous suppliants, all agape ; 

Then, cowering o'er them with expanded wings, 

She felt how sweet it is to be a mother. 

Of these, a few, with melody untaught, 

Turn'd all the air to music within hearing, 

Themselves unseen ; while bolder quiristers 

On loftiest branches strain'd their clarion-pipes. 

And made the forest echo to their screams 

Discordant, — yet there was no discord there, 

But temper'd harmony ; all tones combining, 

In the rich confluence of ten thousand tongues. 

To tell of joy and to inspire it. Who 

Could hear such concert, and not join in chorus ? 

Not I ; — sometimes entranced, I seem'd to float 

Upon a buoyant sea of sounds ; again 

With curious ear I tried to disentangle 

The maze of voices, and with eye as nice 

To single out each minstrel, and pursue 

His httle song through all its labyrinth. 

Till my soul enter'd into him, and felt 

Every vibration of his thrilling throat, 

Pulse of his heart, and flutter of his pinions. 

Often, as one among the multitude, 

I sang from very fulness of delight ; 

Now hke a winged fisher of the sea. 

Now a recluse among the woods, — enjoying 



The bliss of all at once, or each in turn. 

In storm and calm, through every change of season, 
Long flourish'd thus that era of our isle ; 
It could not last for ever : mark the end. 

A cloud arose amid the tranquil heaven, 
Like a man's hand, but held a hurricane 
Within its grasp. Compress'd into a point. 
The tempest struggled to break loose. No breath 
Was stirring, yet the billows roU'd aloof, 
And the air moan'd portentously ; ere long 
The sky was hidden, darkness to be felt 
Confounded all things ; land and water vanish'd, 
And there was silence through the universe ; 
Silence, that made my soul as desolate 
As the Wind sohtude around. Methought 
That I had pass'd the bitterness of death 
Without the agony, — had, unaware, 
Enter'd the unseen world, and in the gap 
Between the life that is and that to come, 
Awaited judgment. Fear and trembling seized 
All that was mortal or immortal in me : 
A moment, and the gates of Paradise 
Might open to receive, or Hell be moved 
To meet me. Strength and spirit fail'd ; 
Eternity enclosed me, and I knew not. 
Knew not, even then, my destiny. To doubt 
Was to despair ; — I doubted and despair'd. 
Then horrible delirium whirl'd me down 
To ocean's nethermost recess ; the waves ' 
Disparting freely, let me fall, and fall, 
Lower and lower, passive as a stone. 
Yet rack'd with miserable pangs, that gave 
The sense of vain but violent resistance : 
And still the depths grew deeper; still the ground 
Receded from my feet as I approach'd it. 
Oh how I long'd to light on rocks, that sunk 
Like quicksands ere I touch'd them ; or to hide 
In caverns ever open to ingulf me. 



THE PELICAN ISLANP. 



But, like the horizon's limit, never nearer ! 

Meanwhile the irrepressible tornado 
Burst, and involved the elements in chaos ; 
Wind, rain, and lightning, in one vast explosion, 
Rush'd from the firmament upon the deep. 
Heaven's adamantine arch seem'd rent asunder, 
And following in a cataract of ruins 
My swift descent through bottomless abysses. 
Where ocean's bed had been absorb'd in nothing. 
I know no farther. When again I saw 
The sun, the sea, the island, all was calm. 
And all was desolation : not a tree. 
Of thousands flourishing erewhile so fair, 
But now was split, uprooted, snapt in twain, 
Or hurl'd with all its honours to the dust. 
Heaps upon heaps, the forest giants lay, 
Even like the slain in battle, fallen to rise 
No more, till heaven, and earth, and sea, with all 
Therein, shall perish, as to me they seem'd 
To perish in that ruthless hurricane. 



CANTO FOURTH. 



Nature and Time were twins. Companions still, 

Their unretarded, unreturning flight 

They hold together. Time, with one sole aim, 

Looks ever onward, like the moon through space 

With beaming forehead, dark and bald behind, 

Nor ever lost a moment in his course. 

Nature looks all around her, like the sun. 

And keeps her works, like his dependent worlds, 

In constant motion. She hath never missed 

One step in her victorious march of change. 

For chance she knows not ; He who made her, gave 



Tlin PELICAN ISLAND. 



His daughter power o'er all except Himself, 

— Power in whate'er she does to do his Avill, 

Behold the true, the royal law of Nature ! — 

Hence failures, hinderances, and devastations 

Are turn'd to trophies of exhaustless skill. 

That out of ruin brings forth strength and beauty, j 

Yea, life and immortality from death. 

I gazed in consternation on the wreck 
Of that fair island, strown with ]n-ostrate trees. 
The soil plough'd up with horrid inundations, 
The surface black with sea- weed, not a glimpse j 

Of verdure peeping; stems, boughs, foliage lay 
Rent, broken, clotted, perishing in slime. 
" How are the mightly fallen !" I exclaimed ; 
" Surely the feller hath come up among ye, 
And with a stroke invisil)le hewn down 
The growth of centuries in one dark hour ! 
Is this the end of all perfection ? This 
The abortive issue of a new creation, 
Erewhile so fruitful in abounding joys, 
And hopes fulfilling more than all they promised ? 
Ages to come can but repair this ravage ; 
The past is lost for ever. Reckless Time 
Stays not ; astonied Nature stands aghast. 
And wrings her hands in silent agony, 
Amidst the annihilation of her works." 

Thus raved I ; but I wrong'd thee, glorious Nature ! 
With whom adversity is but transition. 
Thou never didst despair, wert never foil'd. 
Nor weary with exhaustion, since the day, 
When, at the word, " Let there be Hght," light sprang, 
And show'd thee rising from primeval darkness, 
That fell back like a veil from thy young form, 
And Chaos fled before the apparition. 

While yet mine eye was mourning o'er the scene. 
Nature and Time were working miracles : 
The isle was renovated ; grass and flowers 
Crept quietly around the fallen trees ; 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



A deeper soil embedded them, and o'er 

The common sepulchre of all their race 

Threw a rich covering of embroider'd turf, 

Lovely to look on as the tranquil main, 

When, in his noonward track, the unclouded sun 

Tints the green waves Avith every hue of heaven, 

More exquisitely brilhant and aerial 

Than morn or evening's gaudier pageantry. 

Amidst that burial of the mighty dead. 

There was a resurrection from the dust 

Of lowly plants, impatient for the light. 

Long interrupted by o'ershadowing woods. 

While in the womb of earth their embryos tarried, 

CJnfructifying, yet imperishable. 

Huge remnants of the forest stood apart, 

Like Tadmor's pillars in the wilderness, 

StartHng the traveller 'midst his thoughts of home ; 

— Bare trunks of broken trees, that gave their heads 

To the wind's axe, but would not yield their roots 

To the uptearing violence of the floods. 

From these a slender race of scions sprang. 

Which with their filial arms embraced and sheltered 

The monumental relics of their sires ; 

But, hmited in number, scatter'd wide. 

And slow of growth, they overran no more 

The Sun's dominions in that open isle. 

Meanwliile the sea-fowl, that survived the storm. 
Whose rage had fleck'd the waves with shatter'd plumes 
And weltering carcasses, the prey of sharks. 
Came from their fastnesses among the rocks. 
And multiplied hke clouds Avhen rains are brooding, 
Or flowers, when clear warm sunshine follows rain. 
The inland birds had perish' d, nor again. 
By airy voyages from shores unknown, 
Was silence broken on the unwooded plains : 
Another race of wing'd inhabitants 
Ere long possess'd and peopled all the soil. 

The sun had sunk Avhere sky and ocean meet. 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



And each might seein the other ; sky below, 

With richest garniture of clouds inlaid ; 

Ocean above with isles and continents, 

Illumined from a source no longer seen : 

Far in the east, through heaven's intenser blue, 

Two brilhant sparks, like sudden stars, appear'd. 

Not stars, indeed, but birds of mighty wing, 

Retorted neck, and javeHn-pointed bill. 

That made the air sigh as they cut it through. 

They gain'd upon the eye, and as they came. 

Enlarged, grew brighter, and display'd their forms, 

Amidst the golden evening ; pearly white. 

But ruby-tinctured. On the loftiest cliff 

They settled, hovering ere they touch'd the ground. 

And uttering, in a language of their own, 

Yet such as every ear might understand. 

And every bosom answer, notes of joy. 

And gratulation for that resting-place. 

Stately and beautiful they stood, and clapt 

Their van-broad pinions, streak'd their ruffled plumes, 

And ever and anon broke off to gaze. 

With yearning pleasure, told in gentle murmurs. 

On that strange land, their destined homeland country. 

Night round them threw her brown transparent gloom. 

Through whicli their lonely images yet shone, 

Like things unearthly, while they bow'd their heads 

On their full bosoms, and reposed till morn. 

I knew the Pelicans, and cried — " All hail ! 

Ye future dwellers in the wilderness !" 

At early dawn I mark'd them in the sky. 
Catching the morning colours on their plumes ; 
Not in voluptuous pastime revelling there. 
Among the rosy clouds, while orient heaven 
Flamed like the opening gates of Paradise, 
Whence issued forth the Angel of the sun, 
And gladden'd Nature with returning day : 
— Eager for food, their searching eyes they fix'd 
On ocean's unroU'd volume, from a height 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



That brought immensity Avithin their scope ; 
Yet with such power of vision look'd they down, 
As though they watch'd the shell-fish slowly gliding 
O'er sunken rocks, or chmbing trees of coral. 
On indefatigable wing upheld. 

Breath, pulse, existence, seem'd suspended in them ; 
They were as pictures painted on the sky ; 
Till suddenl)^ aslant, away they shot, 
Like meteors changed from stars to gleams of lightning, 
And struck upon the deep ; where, in wild play, 
Their quarry flounder'd, vmsuspecting harm. 
With terrible voracity, they plunged 
Their heads among the affrighted shoals, and beat 
A tempest on the surges with their wings, 
Till flashing clouds of foam and spray conceal'd them. 
Nimbly they seized and secreted their prey. 
Alive and wriggling in the elastic net. 
Which Nature hung beneath their grasping beaks ; 
Till, swoln with captures, the unwieldy burden 
Clogg'd their slow flight, as heavily to land 
These mighty hunters of the deep return'd. 
There on the cragged cliffs they perch'd at ease, 
Gorging their hapless victims one by one ; 
Then full and wear3% side by side, they slept. 
Till evening roused them to the chase again. 
Harsh seems the ordinance, that life by life 
Should be sustain'd, and yet when all must die, 
And be like water spilt upon the ground. 
Which none can gather up, the speediest fate, 
Though violent and terrible, is best. 
O with what horrors would creation groan, — 
What agonies would ever be before us. 
Famine and pestilence, disease, despair. 
Anguish and pain in every hideous shape. 
Had all to Avait the slow decay of Nature ! 
Life were a martyrdom of sympathy. 
Death, lingering, raging, writhing, shrieking torture ; 
The grave would be abolished ; this gay world 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



A valley of dry bones, a Golgotha, 

In which the living stumbled o'er the dead. 

Till they could fall no more, and blind perdition 

SAvept frail mortality away for ever. 

'Twas wisdom, mercy, goodness, that ordain'd 

Life in such infinite profusion, — Death 

So sure, so prompt, so multiform to those 

That never sinn'd, that know not guilt, that fear 

No wrath to come, and have no heaven to lose. 

Love found that lonely cou})le on their isle. 
And soon surrounded them with blithe companions. 
The noble birds, with skill spontaneous, framed 
A nest of reeds among the giant-grass, 
That waved in lights and shadows o'er the soil. 
There, in sweet thraldom, yet unweening why. 
The patient dam, who ne'er till now had known 
Parental instinct, brooded o'er her eggs, 
Long ere she found the curious secret out. 
That life was hatching in their brittle shells. 
Then, from a wild rapacious bird of prey. 
Tamed by the kindly process, she became 
That gentlest of all living things — a mother ; 
Gentlest while yearning o'er her naked young. 
Fiercest when stirr'd by anger to defend them. 
Her mate himself the softening power confess'd. 
Forgot his sloth, restrain'd his appetite. 
And ranged the sky and fish'd the stream for her ; 
Or, when o'erwearied Nature forced her off 
To shake her torpid feathers in the breeze. 
And bathe her besom in the cooling flood, 
He took her place, and felt through every nerve, 
While the plump nestlings throbb'd against his heart, 
The tenderness that makes the vulture mild ; 
Yea, half unwillingly his post resign'd. 
When, home-sick with the absence of an hour, 
She hurried back, and drove him from her seat 
With pecking bill, and cry of fond distress, 
Answer'd bv him with murmurs of delio;ht, 



Whose gutturals harsh, to lier were love's own music. 

Then, settling- down, like foam upon the wave, 

Wliite, flickering-, effervescent, soon subsiding, 

Her ruffled pinions smoothly she composed ; 

And, while beneath the comfort of her wings, 

Her crowded progeny quite fill'd the nest, 

The halcyon sleeps not sounder, when the wind 

Is breathless, and the sea without a curl, 

— Nor dreams the halcyon of serener days, 

Or nights more beautiful with silent stars, 

Than, in that hour, the mother Pelican, 

When the warm tumults of affection sunk 

Into calm sleep, and dreams of what they were, 

— Dreams more delicious than reality. 

— He sentinel beside her stood, and watch'd. 

With jealous eye, the raven in the clouds, 

And the rank sea-mews wheeling round the chffs. 

Wo to the reptile then that ventured nigh ; 

The snap of his tremendous bill was like 

Death's scythe, down-cutting every thing it struck. 

The heedless hzard, in his gambols, peep'd 

Upon the guarded nest, from out the flowers, 

But paid the instant forfeit of his life ; 

Nor could the serpent's subtilty elude 

Capture, when gliding by, nor in defence 

Might his malignant fangs and venom save him. 

Erelong the thriving brood outgrew their cradle, 
Ran through the grass, and dabbled in the pools ; 
No sooner denizens of earth than made 
Free both of air and water ; day by day. 
New lessons, exercises, and amusements 
Employ'd the old to teach, the young to learn. 
Now floating on the blue lagoon behold them ; 
The Sire and Dam in swanhke beauty steering. 
Their Cygnets following through the foamy wake, 
Picking the leaves of plants, pursuing insects, 
Or catching at the bubbles as they broke : 
Till on some minor fry, in reedy shallows, 



With flapping pinions and unsparing beaks, 

The well-taught scholars plied their double art, 

To fish in troubled waters, and secure 

The petty captives in their maiden pouches ; 

Then hunj with their banquet to the shore. 

With feet, Avings, breast, half-swimming and half-flying. 

But when their pens grew strong to fight the storm, 

And buffet with the breakers on the reef. 

The Parents put them to severer proof: 

On beetling rocks the little ones were marshall'd ; 

There, by endearments, stripes, example urged 

To try the void convexity of heaven 

And plough the ocean's horizontal field. 

Timorous at first, they flutter'd round the verge, 

Balanced and furl'd their hesitating wings. 

Then put them forth again with steadier aim ; 

Now, gaining courage as they felt the wind 

Dilate their feathers, fill their airy frames 

W^ith buoyancy that bore them from their feet. 

They yielded all their burden to the breeze, 

And sail'd and soar'd where'er their guardians led ; 

Ascending, hovering, wheeling, or alighting. 

They search'd the deep in quest of nobler game 

Than yet their inexperience had encounter'd ; 

With these they battled in that element, 

Where wings or fins Avere equally at home, 

Till, conquerors in many a desperate strife. 

They dragg'd their spoils to land, and gorged at leisure 

Thus perfected in all the arts of life. 
That simple Pehcans jequire, — save one, 
W^hich mother-bird did never teach her daughter, 
— The inimitable art to build a nest ; 
Love, for his own dehghtful school, reserving 
That mystery which novice never fail'd 
To learn infallibly when taught by him : 
— Hence that small masterpiece of Nature's art, 
Still unimpair'd, still unimproved, remains 
The same in site, material, shape, and texture. 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 

While every kind a different structure frames, 

All build alike of each pecuhar kind : 

The nightingale, that dwelt in Adam's bower, 

And pour'd her stream of music through his dreams ; 

The soaring lark, that led the eye of Eve 

Into the clouds, her thoughts into the heaven 

Of heavens, where lark nor eye can penetrate ; 

The dove, that perch'd upon the Tree of Life, 

And made her bed amongst the thickest leaves ; 

All the wing'd habitants of Paradise, 

Whose songs once mingled with the songs of Angels, 

Wove their first nests as curiously and well 

As the wood-minstrels in our evil day, * 

After the labours of six thousand years. 

In which their ancestors have fail'd to add, 

To alter or diminish, any thing 

In that, of which Love only knows the secret. 

And teaches every mother for herself. 

Without the power to impart it to her offspring : 

— Thus perfected in all the arts of life. 

That simple Pelicans require, save this, 

Those Parents drove their young away ; the young 

Gaily forsook their parents. Soon enthrall'd 

With love-alliances among themselves. 

They built their nests, as happy instinct wrought 

Within their bosoms, wakening poAvers unknown. 

Till sweet necessity Avas laid upon them ; 

They bred, and rear'd their httle famihes. 

As they were train'd and disciplined before. 

Thus wings were multiplied from year to year. 
And ere the patriarch-twain, in good old age, 
Resign'd their breath beside that ancient nest. 
In which themselves had nursed a hundred broods, 
The isle was peopled with their progeny. 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



CANTO FIFTH. 



Meanwhile, not idle, though unwatch'd by me, 
The coral architects in silence rcar'd 
Tower after tower beneath the dark abyss. 
Pyramidal in form the fabrics rose, 
From ample basements narrowing to the height, 
Until they pierced the surface of the flood. 
And dimpling eddies sparkled round their peaks. 
Then (if great things with small may be compared) 
They spread like water-lilies, whose broad leaves 
Make green and sunny islets on the pool. 
For golden flies, on summer-days, to haunt. 
Safe from the lightning-seizure of the trout ; 
Or yield their laps to catch the minnow springing 
Clear from the stream to 'scape the ruffian pike. 
That prowls in disappointed rage beneath, 
And wonders where the httle wretch found refuge. 
One headland topt the waves, another follow'd ; 
A third, a tenth, a twentieth soon appear'd, 
Till the long barren gulf in travail lay 
With many an infant struggling into birth. 
Larger they grew and lovelier, when they breathed 
The vital air, and felt the genial sun ; 
As though a living spirit dwelt in each, 
Which, like the inmate of a flexile shell. 
Moulded the shapeless slough with its own motion. 
And painted it with colours of the morn. 
Amidst that group of younger sisters stood 
The Isle of Pelicans, as stands the moon 
At midnight, queen among the minor stars, 
Differing in splendour, magnitude, and distance. 
So look'd that archipelago ; small isles, 
By interwinding channels link'd, yet sunder'd ; 
All flourishing in peaceful fellowship, 
Like forest oaks that love society : 
— Of various growth and progress ; here, a rock 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 

On Avhich a single palm-tree AA-aved its banner ; 
There sterile tracts unmoulder'd into soil ; 
Yonder, dark woods whose foliage swept the water, 
Without a speck of turf, or hne of shore, 
As though their roots Avere anchor'd in the ocean. 
But most were gardens redolent Avith flowers. 
And orchards bending Avith Hesperian fruit, 
That realized the dreams of olden time. 

Throughout this commonAvealth of sea-sprung lands, 
Life kindled in ten thousand happy forms ; 
Earth, air, and ocean Avere all full of life. 
Still highest in the rank of being, soar'd 
The fowls amphibious, and the inland tribes 
Of dainty plumage or melodious song. 
In gaudy robes of many colour'd patches, 
The parrots swung like blossoms on the trees, 
While their harsh voices undeceiA'-ed the ear. 
More delicately pencill'd, finer draAA'n 
In shape and lineament : too exquisite 
For gross delights ; the Birds of Paradise 
Floated aloof, as though they lived on air, 
And Avere the orient progeny of heaven, 
Or spirits made perfect A-eil'd in shining raiment. 
From flower to floAver, Avhere wild bees fleAv and sung, 
As countless, small, and musical as they, 
ShoAvers of bright humming-birds came doAA-n, and plied 
The same ambrosial task, Avith slender bill 
Extracting honey, hidden in those bell-s. 
Whose richest blooms greAV pale beneath the blaze 
Of tAA'inkling Avinglets hovering o'er their petals. 
Brilliant as raindrops, Avhen the AA^estern sun 
Sees his OAvn miniature of beams in each. 

High on the clifl^s, doAvn on the shelly reef, 
Or gliding like a silver-shaded cloud 
Through the blue heaven, the mighty albatross 
Inhaled the breezes, sought his humble food. 
Or, Avhere his kindred like a flock reposed. 
Without a shepherd, on the grassy doAA^is, 



THR PELICAN ISLAND. 



Smooth'd his white fleece, and shimber'd in their midst. 

Wading through marshes, where the rank sea-weed 
With spongy moss and flaccid lichens strove, 
Flamingoes, in their crimson tunics, stalk'd 
On stately legs, with far-exploring eye ; 
Or fed and slept, in regimental lines, 
Watch'd by their sentinels, whose clarion-screams 
All in an instant woke the startled troop. 
That mounted hke a glorious exhalation. 
And vanish'd through the welkin far away, 
Nor paused till, on some lonely coast alighting, 
Again their gorgeous cohort took the field. 

The fierce sea-eagle, humble in attire, 
In port terrific, from his lonely eyrie 
(Itself a burden for the tallest tree) 
Look'd down o'er land and sea as his dominions : 
Now, from long chase, descending with his prey. 
Young seal or dolphin, in his deadly clutch, 
He fed his eaglets in the noonday sun : 
Nor less at midnight ranged the deep for game ; 
At length entrapp'd with his own talons, struck 
Too deep to be withdrawn, where a strong shark. 
Roused by the anguish, with impetuous plunge, 
Dragg'd his assailant down into the abyss. 
Struggling in vain for liberty and life ; 
His young ones heard their parent's dying shrieks, 
And watch'd in vain for his returning wing. 

Here ran the stormy petrels on the waves. 
As though they were the shadows of themselves 
Reflected from a loftier flight through space. 
The stern and gloomy raven haunted here, 
A hermit of the atmosphere, on land 
Among vociferating crowds a stranger. 
Whose hoarse, low, ominous croak disclaim'd communion 
With those, upon the offal of whose meals 
He gorged alone, or tore their own rank corses : 
The heavy penguin, neither fish nor fowl. 
With scaly feathers and witli finny wings, 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



Plump'd Stone-like from the rock into the gulf, 
Rebounding upward swift as from a sling. 
Through yielding water as through hmpid air, 
The cormorant, Death's living arrow, flew. 
Nor ever miss'd a stroke, or dealt a second. 
So true the infallible destroyer's aim. 

Millions of creatures such as these, and kinds 
Unnamed by man, possess'd those busy isles ; 
Each in its brief existence, to itself. 
The first, last being in the universe. 
With whom the whole began, endured, and ended : 
Blest ignorance of bliss, not made for them ! 
Happy exemption from the fear of death, 
And that which makes the pangs of death immortal. 
The undying worm, the fire unquenchable, 
— Conscience, the bosom-hell of guilty man ! 
The eyes of all look'd up to Him, whose hand 
Had made them, and supphed their daily need ; 
Although they knew Him not, they look'd to Him ; 
And He, whose mercy is o'er all his works, ■> 

Forgot not one of his large family, 
But cared for each as for an only child. 
They plough'd not, sow'd not, gather'd not in barns. 
Thought not of yesterday, nor knew to-morrow ; 
Yet harvests inexhaustible they reap'd 
In the prolific furrows of the main ; 
Or from its sunless caverns brought to light 
Treasures for which contending kings might war, — 
Gems, for which queens would yield their hands to slavesy 
By them despised as valueless and naught ; 
From the rough shell they pick'd the luscious food, 
And left a prince's ransom in the pearl. 

Nature's prime favourites were the Pelicans ; 
High-fed, long-lived, and sociable and free. 
They ranged in wedded pairs, or martial bands, 
For play or slaughter. Oft have I beheld 
A little army take the watery field, 
With outstretch'd pinions form a spacious ring. 




Then pressing to the centve, through the waves, 
Enclose thick shoals witliin their narrowing toils, 
Till multitudes entangled fell a prey : 
Or, when the flying-fish in sudden clouds 
Burst from the sea, and flutter'd through the air, 
These giant fowlers snapt them like musquitoes 
By swallows hunted through the summer sky. 

I turn'd again to look upon that isle. 
Whence from one pair those colonies had issued 
That through these Cyclades at freedom roved, 
Fish'd every stream, and fed on every shore ; 
When, lo ! a spectacle of strange extremes 
Awaken'd sweet and melancholy thoughts : 
All that is helpless, beautiful, endearing 
In infancy, in prime of youth, in love ; 
All that is mournful in decay, old age, 
And dissolution ; all that awes the eye. 
And chills the bosom, in the sad remains 
Of poor mortality, which last awhile. 
To show that life hath been, but is no longer ; 
— All these in blended images appear'd, 
Exulting, brooding, perishing before me. 
It was a land of births. — Unnumber'd nests, 
Of reeds and rushes, studded all the ground, 
A few were desolate and fallen to ruin ; 
Many were building from those waste materials ; 
On some the dams were sitting, till the stroke 
Of their quick bills should break the prison-shells, 
And let the little captives forth to light, 
With their first breath demanding food and shelter : 
In others I beheld the brood new fledged. 
Struggling to clamber out, take -wing and fly 
Up to the heavens, or fathom the abyss. 
Meanwhile the parent from the sea supplied 
A daily feast, and from the pure lagoon 
Brought living water in her sack, to cool 
The impatient fever of their clamorous throats. 
No need had she, as hieroglyphics feign, 




{A m3''stic lesson of maternal love,) 

To pierce her breast, and with the vital stream, 

Warm from its fountain, slake their thirst in blood, 

— The blood which nourish'd them ere they were hatch'd. 

"While the crude egg- Avithin herself was forming. 

It was a land of death. — Between those nests 
The quiet earth was feather'd with the spoils 
Of aged Pelicans, that hither came 
To die in peace, where they had spent in love 
The sweetest periods of their long existence. 
Where they were wont to build, and breed their young, 
There they lay down to rise no more for ever, 
And close their eyes upon the dearest sight | 

On which their living eyes had loved to dwell, 
— The nest where every joy to them was centred. 
There rife corruption tainted them so lightly. 
The moisture seem'd to vanish from their rehcs,- 
As dew from gossamer, that leaves the net-work 
Spread on the ground, and glistening in the sun ; 
Thus when a breeze the ruffled plumage stirr'd. 
That lay hke drifted snow upon the soil. 
Their slender skeletons were seen beneath. 
So delicately framed, and half transparent. 
That I have marvell'd how a bird so noble, 
When in his fuU, magnificent attire, 
With pinions wider than the king of vultures, 
And down elastic, thicker than the swan's, 
Should leave so small a cage of ribs to mark 
Where vigorous life had dwelt a hundred j^ears. 

Such was that scene ; the dying and the dead, 
Next neighbours to the living and the unborn. 
Oh how much happiness was here enjoy'd ! 
How little misery had been suffer'd here ! 
Those humble Pelicans had each fulfill'd 
The utmost purpose of its span of being, 
And done its duty in its narrow circle. 
As surely as the sun, in his career. 
Accomplishes the glorious end of his. 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



CANTO SIXTH. 



"And thus," methought, "ten thousand suns may lead 

The stars to glory in their annual courses ; 

Moons without number thus may wax and wane, 

And winds alternate blow in cross-monsoons. 

While here — through self-beginning rounds, self-ending. 

Then self-renew'd, without advance or failure, — 

Existence fluctuates only hke the tide. 

Whose everlasting changes bring no change, 

But billow follows billow to the shore. 

Recoils, and billow out of billow swells ; 

An endless whirl of ebbing, flowing foam. 

Where every bubble is like every other. 

And Ocean's face immutable as Heaven's. 

Here is no progress to sublimer life ; 

Nature stands still, — stands at the very point. 

Whence from a vantage-ground her bolder steps 

Might rise resplendent on the scale of being ; 

Rank over rank, awakening with her tread, 

Inquisitive, intelhgent ; aspiring 

Each above other, all above themselves. 

Till every generation should transcend 

The former, as the former all the past. 

" Such, such alone were meet inhabitants 
For these fair isles, so wonderfully form'd 
Amidst the solitude of sea and sky. 
On which my wandering spirit first was cast. 
And still beyond whose girdle, eye nor wing 
Can carry me to undiscover'd climes, 
Where many a nobler race may dwell ; whose waifs 
And exiles, toss'd by tempests on the flood, 
Hither might drift upon their native trees ; 
Or, like their own free birds, on fearless pinions. 
Make voyages amidst the pathless heaven, 
And, lighting, colonize these fertile tracts, 
Recover'd from the barrenness of ocean, 



I 



m\ 



Whose wealth might well repay the brave adventure. 

— Hath Nature spent her strength ? Why stopp'd she here 1 

Why stopp'd not lower, if to rise no higher ? 

Can she not summon from more ancient regions, 

Beyond the rising or the setting sun, 

Creatures, as far above the mightiest here 

As yonder eagle, flaming at high noon, 

Outsoars the bat that flutters through the twilight ? 

Or as the tender Pelican excels 

The anomalous abortion of the rock. 

In which plant, fossil, animal unite ? 

" But changes here may happen — changes must ! 
What hinders that new shores should yet ascend 
Out of the bosom of the deep, and spread 
Till all converge, from one circumference, 
Into a solid breadth of table-land, 
Bound by the horizon, canopied Avith heaven. 
And ocean in its own abyss absorb'd ?" 

While these imaginations cross'd the mind. 
My thoughts fulfill'd themselves before mine eyes ; 
The islands moved hke circles upon water. 
Expanding till they touch'd each other, closed 
The interjacent straits, and thus became 
A spacious continent which flll'd the sea. 
That change was total, like a birth, a death ; 
— Birth, that from native darkness brings to light 
The young inhabitant of this gay Avorld ; 
Death, that from seen to unseen things removes, 
And swallows time up in eternity. 
That which had been, for ever ceased to be, 
And that which follow'd was a new creation 
Wrought from the disappearance of the old. 
So fled that pageant universe away. 
With all its isles and waters. So I found 
Myself translated to that other world, 
By sleight of fancy, hke the unconscious act 
Of waking from a pleasant dream, with sweet 
Relapse into a more transporting vision. 



The nursery of brooding Pelicans, 
The dormitory of their dead, had vanish'd, 
And all the minor spots of rock and verdure, 
The abodes of happy millions, were no more : 
But in their place a shadowy landscape lay. 
On whose extremest western verge, a gleam 
Of living silver, to the downward sun 
Intensely ghttering, mark'd the boundary line, 
Which ocean, held by chains invisible. 
Fretted and foam'd in vain to overleap. 
Woods, mountains, valleys, rivers, glens, and plains 
Diversified the scene : — that" scene was wild. 
Magnificent, deform'd, or beautiful, 
As framed expressly for all kinds of Hfe, 
With all life's labours, sufferings, and enjoyments, 
Untouch'd as yet by any meaner hand 
Than His who made it, and pronounced it good. 
And good it was ; — free as light, air, fire, Avater, 
To every thing that breathed upon its surface. 
From the small worm that crept abroad at midnight 
To sip cool dews, and feed on sleeping flowers, 
Then slunk into its hole, the httle vampire ! 
Through every species which I yet had seen, 
To animals, of tribes and forms unknown 
In the lost islands ; — beasts that ranged the forests, 
Grazed in the valleys, bounded o'er the hills. 
Reposed in rich savannas, from gray rocks 
Pick'd the thin herbage sprouting through their fissures ; 
Or in waste howling deserts found oases, 
And fountains pouring sweeter streams than nectar. 
And more melodious than the nightingale, 
— So to the faint and perishing they seem'd. 

I gazed on ruminating herds of kine, 
And sheep for ever wandering ; goats that swung 
Like spiders on the crags, so slight their hold ; 
Deer, playful as their fawns, in peace, but fell. 
As battling bulls, in wars of jealousy : 
Through flowery champaigns roam'd the fleet gazelles, 



I 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



Of many a colour, size, and shape, — all graceful ; 
In every look, step, attitude prepared, 
Even at the shadow of a cloud, to vanish. 
And leave a soHtude where thousands stood, 
With heads declined, and nibbling eagerly 
As Iccusts when they light on some new soil, 
And move no more till they have shorn it bare. 
On these, with famine vmappeasable, 
Lithe, muscular, huge-boned and Hmb'd for leaping, 
The brindled tyrants of brute nature prey'd : 
The weak and timid bow'd before the strong. 
The many by the few were hourly slaughter'd, 
Where power was right, and violence was law. 

Here couch'd the panting tiger, on the Avatch ; 
Impatient but unmoved, his fire-ball eyes 
Made horrid twilight in the sunless jungle. 
Till on the heedless buffalo he sprang, 
Dragg'd the low-bellowing monster to his lair, 
Crash'd through the ribs at once into its heart, 
Quaff'd the hot blood, and gorged the quivering flesh, 
Till drunk he lay, as powerless as the carcass. 

There, to the solitary lion's roar 
So many echoes answer'd, that there seem'd, 
Ten in the field for one ; — where'er they turn'd. 
The flying animals, from cave to cave, 
Heard his voice issuing ; and recoil'd aghast. 
Only to meet it nearer than before, 
Or, ere they saw his shadow or his face. 
Fall dead beneath his thunder-striking paw. 

Cah-n amidst scenes of havoc, in his own 
Huge strength impregnable, the elephant 
Offended none, but led his quiet life 
Among his old contemporary trees, 
Till Nature laid him gently down to rest 
Beneath the palm, which he was wont to make 
His prop in slumber ; there his relics lay 
Longer than Hfe itself had dwelt within them. 
Bees in the ample hollow of his skull 



Piled their wax-citadels, and stored their honey ; 
Thence sallied forth to forage through the fields, 
And swarm'd in emigrating legions thence : 
There, little burrowing animals threw up 
Hillocks beneath the overarching ribs ; 
While birds, within the spinal labyrinth. 
Contrived their nests : — so wandering Arabs pitch 
Their tents amidst Palmyra's palaces ; 
So Greek and Roman peasants build their huts 
Beneath the shadow of the Parthenon 
Or on the ruins of the Capitol. 

But uninteUigent creation soon 
Fail'd to delight ; the novelty departed, 
And all look'd desolate ; my eye grew weary 
Of seeing that which it might see for ever 
Without a new idea or emotion ; 
The mind within me panted after mind. 
The spirit sigh'd to meet a kindred spirit. 
And in my human heart there was a void, 
Which nothing but humanity could fill. 
At length, as though a prison-door were open'd, 
Chains had fall'n off, and by an angel-guide 
Conducted, I escaped that desert-bourne ; 
And instantaneously I travell'd on. 
Yet knew not how, for wings nor feet I plied. 
But with a motion, hke the lapse of thought. 
O'er many a vale and mountain I was carried, 
Till in the east, above the ocean's brim, 
I saw the morning sun, and stay'd my course. 
Where vestiges of rude but social life 
Arrested and detain'd attention long. 

Amidst the crowd of grovelling animals, 
A being more majestic stood before me ; 
I met an eye that look'd into my soul, 
And seem'd to penetrate mine inmost thoughts. 
Instinctively I turn'd away to hide them, 
For shame and quick compunction came upon me. 
As though detected on forbidden ground, 



I 



I 



Gazing on things unlawful : but my heart 

Relented quickly, and my bosom throbb'd 

With such unutterable tenderness, 

That every sympathy of human nature 

Was by the beating of a pulse enkindled, 

And flash'd at once throughout the mind's recesses, 

As in a darken'd chamber, objects start 

All round the walls, the moment light breaks in. 

The sudden tumult of surprise awoke 

My spirit from that trance of vague abstraction, 

Wherein I lived through ages, and beheld 

Their generations pass so swiftly by me. 

That years were moments in their flight, and hours 

The scenes of crowded centuries reveal'd ; 

I sole spectator of the wondrous changes, 

Spell-bound as in a dream, and acquiescing 

In all that happen'd, though perplex'd with strange 

Conceit of something wanting through the whole. 

That spell was broken, like the vanish'd film 

From eyes born blind, miraculously open'd ;— 

'Twas gone, and I became myself again, 

Restored to memory of all I knew 

From books or schools, the world or sage experience : 

With all that folly or misfortune taught me, — 

Each hath her lessons, — wise are they that learn. 

Still the mysterious revery went on. 

And I was still sole witness of its issues. 

But with clear mind and disenchanted sight, 

Beholding, judging, comprehending all ; 

Not passive and bewilder'd as before. 

What was the being which I then beheld ? 
— Man going forth amidst inferior creatures : 
Not as he rose in Eden out of dust. 
Fresh from the moulding hand of Deity ; 
Immortal breath upon his lips ; the light 
Of uncreated glor)^ in his soul ; 
Lord of the nether universe, and heir 
Of all above him, — all above the sky. 



10 THE PELICAN ISLAND. 

The sapphire pavement of his future palace : 

Not so ; — but rather like that morning star, 

Which from the highest empyrean fell 

Into the bottomless abyss of darkness ; 

There flaming only with malignant beams 

Among the constellations of his peers, 

The third part of heaven's host, with him cast down 

To irretrievable perdition, — thence. 

Amidst the smoke of unillumined fires. 

Issuing like horrid sparks to blast creation : 

— Thus, though in dim echpse, before me stood, 

As from a world invisible call'd up, 

Man, in the image of his Maker form'd, 

Man, to the image of his tempter fall'n ; 

Yet still as far above infernal fiends. 

As once a little lower than the angels. 

I knew him, own'd him, loved him, and exclaim'd, 

" Bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh, my Brother ! 

Hail in the depth of thy humihation ; 

For dear thou art, amidst unconscious ruin, — 

Dear to the kindhest feelings of my soul, 

As though one womb had borne us, and one mother 

At her sweet breasts had nourish'd us as twins." 

I saw him sunk in loathsome degradation, 
A naked, fierce, ungovernable savage, 
Companion to the brutes, himself more brutal ; 
Superior only in the craft that made 
The serpent subtlest beast of all the field, 
Whose guile unparadised the world, and brought 
A curse upon the earth which God had blessed. 
That curse was here, without the mitigation 
Of healthful toil, that half redeems the ground 
Whence man was taken, whither he returns. 
And which repays him bread for patient labour, 
— Labour, the symbol of his punishment, 
— Labour, the secret of his happiness. 
The curse was here ; for thorns and briers o'erran 
The tangled labyrinths, yel briers bare roses, 



And thorns threw out their annual snow of blossoms : 

The curse was here ; and yet the soil untill'd 

Pour'd forth spontaneous and abundant harvests. 

Pulse and small berries, maize in strong luxuriance, 

And slender rice that grew by many waters : 

The forests cast their fruits, in husk or rind, 

Yielding sweet kernels or dehcious pulp, 

Smooth oil, cool milk, and unfermented wine, 

In rich and exquisite variety. 

On these the indolent inhabitants 

Fed without care or forethought, hke the swine 

That grubb'd the turf, and taught them Avhere to look 

For dainty earth-nuts and nutritious roots ; 

Or the small monkeys, capering on the boughs, 

And rioting on nectar and ambrosia. 

The produce of that Paradise run wild : — 

No, — these were merry, if they were not wise ; 

While man's untutor'd hordes Avere sour and sullen. 

Like those ahhorr'd baboons, whose gluttonous taste 

They follow'd safely in their choice of food ; 

And whose brute semblance of humanity 

Made them more hideous than their prototypes. 

That bore the genuine image and inscription. 

Defaced indeed, but yet indehble. 

— From ravening beasts, and fowls that fish'd the ocean. 

Men learn'd to prey on meaner animals. 

But found a secret out which birds or beasts. 

Most cruel, cunning, treacherous, never knew, 

— The luxury of devouring one another. 

Such were my kindred in their lost estate, 
From whose abominations while I turn'd. 
As from a pestilence, I mourn'd and wept 
With bitter lamentation o'er their ruin ; 
Sunk as they were in ignorance of all 
That raises man above his origin. 
And elevates to heaven the spirit within him. 
To which the Almighty's breath gave understanding. 

Large was their stature, and their frames athletic ; 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



Their skins were dark, their locks hke eagles' feathers ; 

Their features terrible ; — when roused to wrath, 

All evil passions lighten'd through their eyes, 

Convulsed their bosoms hke possessing fiends. 

And loosed what sets on fire the course of nature, 

— The tongue of malice, set on fire of hell. 

Which then, in cataracts of horrid sounds. 

Raged through their gnashing teeth and foaming lips, 

Making the ear to tingle, and the soul 

Sicken, with spasms of strange revolting horror. 

As if the blood changed colour in the veins, 

While hot and cold it ran about the heart, 

And red to pale upon the cheek it show'd. 

Their visages at rest were winter-clouds, 

Fix'd gloom, whence sun nor shower could be foretold. 

But, in high revelry, when full of prey. 

Cannibal prey, tremendous was their laughter ; 

Their joy, the shock of earthquakes overturning 

Mountains, and swamping rivers in their course ; 

Or subterranean elements embroil'd, — 

Wind, fire, and water, till the cleft volcano 

Gives to their devastating fury vent : 

That joy was lurking hatred in disguise, 

And not less fatal in its last excess. 

They danced, — hke whirlwinds in the Libyan waste, 

AVhen the dead sand starts up in living pillars. 

That mingle, part, and cross, then burst in ruin 

On man and beast ; — they danced to shouts and screams, 

Drums, gongs, and horns, their deafening din inflicting 

On nerves and ears enra})tured with such clangour ; 

Till mirth grew madness, and the feast a fray. 

That left the field strown with unnatural carnage. 

To furnish out a more unnatural least, 

And lay, the train to inflame a bloodier fray. 

They dwelt in dens and caverns of the earth. 
Won by the valiant from their brute possessors. 
And held in hourly peril of reprisals 
From the ferocious brirrands of tlie woods : 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



The lioness, benighted with her whelps, 

There seeking shelter from the drenching storm, 

Met with unseen resistance on the threshold, 

And perish'd ere she knew by what she fell ; 

Or, finding all within asleep, surprised 

The inmates in their dreams, from which no more 

Her deadly vengeance suffer'd them to wake. 

— On open plains they framed low, narrow huts 

Of boughs, the wreck of windfalls or of Time, 

Wattled with canes, and thatch'd with reeds and leaves ; 

There from afflictive noon sought twilight shadow, 

Or slumber'd in the smoke of greenwood fires, 

To drive away the pestilent musquitoes. 

— Some built unAvieldy nests among the trees, 

In which to doze by night, or watch by day 

The joyful moment, from that ambuscade 

To slay the passing antelope, or wound 

The jackal chasing it, with sudden arrows 

From bows that task'd a giant's strength to bend. 

In flight or combat, on the champaign field. 

They ran atilt with flinty-headed spears ; 

Or launch'd the lighter javelin through the air, 

Follow'd its motion with a basiHsk's eye. 

And shriek'd with gladness when a life was spiU'd : 

They sent the pebble hissing from the shng. 

Hot as the curse from lips that would strike dead. 

If words were stones ; here stones, as swift as words 

Can reach the ear, the unwary victim smote. 

In closer conflict, breast to breast, when one 

Or both must perish on the spot, they fought 

With clubs of iron-wood and ponderous force, 

Wielded with terrible dexterity, 

And failing down like thunderbolts, which naught 

But counter-thunderbolts could meet or parry. 

Rude-fashion'd weapons ! yet the lion's jaws, 

The tiger's grasp, the eagle's beak and talons, 

The serpent's fangs, were not more formidable, 

More sure to hit, or, hitting, sure to kill. 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



They knew not shame nor honour, yet knew pride ; 
— The pride of strength, skill, speed, and subtilty ; 
The pride of tyranny and violence. 
Not o'er the mighty only, whom their arm 
Had crush'd in battle or had basely slain 
By treacherous ambush, or more treacherous smiles, 
Embracing while they stabb'd the heart that met 
Their specious seeming with unguarded breast : 
— The reckless savages display'd their pride 
By vile oppression in its vilest forms, — 
Oppression of the weak and innocent ; 
Infancy, womanhood, old age, disease. 
The lame, the halt, the blind, were wrong'd, neglected. 
Exposed to perish by Avild beasts in woods, 
Cast to the crocodiles in rivers ; murder'd. 
Even by their dearest kindred, in cold blood. 
To rid themselves of Nature's gracious burdens, 
In mercy laid on man to teach him mercy. 

But their prime glory was insane debauch. 
To inflict and bear excruciating tortures ; 
The unshrinking victim, while the flesh was rent 
From his hve hmbs, and eaten in his presence. 
Still in his death-pangs taunted his tormentors 
With tales of cruelty more diabolic, 
Wreak'd by himself upon the friends of those 
Who now their impotence of vengeance wasted 
On him, and drop by drop his life extorted 
With thorns and briers of the Avilderness, 
Or the slow violence of untouching fire. 

Vanity too, pride's mannikin, here play'd 
Satanic tricks to ape her master-fiend. 
The leopard's beauteous spoils, the lion's mane, 
Engirt the loins, and waved upon the shoulders 
Of those whose wiles or arms had won such trophies : 
Rude-punctured figures of all loathsome things. 
Toads, scorpions, asps, snakes' eyes and double tongue, 
In flagrant colours on their tattooed limbs. 
Gave proof of intellect, not dead but sleeping, 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



And in its trance enacting strange vagaries. 
Bracelets of human teeth, fangs of Avild beasts, 
The jaAvs of sharks, and beaks of ravenous birds, 
Ghtter'd and tinkled round their arms and ankles ; 
While skulls of slaughter'd enemies, in chains 
Of natural elf-locks, dangled from the necks 
Of those, whose own bare skulls and cannibal teeth 
Ere long must deck more puissant fiends than they. 

On ocean, too, they exercised dominion ; — 
Of hollow trees composing slight canoes. 
They paddled o'er the reefs, cut through the breakers, 
And rode the untamed billows far from shore ; 
Amphibious from their infancy, and fearing 
Naught in the deepest waters save the shark ; 
Even him, well arm'd, they gloried to encounter, 
And when he turn'd to ope those gates of death, 
That led into the Hades of his gorge. 
Smote with such stern decision to his vitals, 
And vanish'd through the blood-beclouded waves. 
That, blind and desperate in his agony. 
Headlong he plunged, and perish'd in the abyss. 

Woman was here the powerless slave of man ; 
Thus fallen Adam tramples fallen Eve, 
Through all the generations of his sons. 
In whose barbarian veins th' old serpent's venom 
Turns pure affection into hideous lust. 
And wrests the might of his superior arm 
(Given to defend and bless his meek companion) 
Into the very yoke and scourge of bondage ; 
Till limbs, by beauty moulded, eyes of gladness, 
And the full bosom of confiding truth, 
Made to dehght and comfort him in toil. 
And change Care's den into a halcyon's nest, 
— Are broke with drudgery, quench'd with stagi 

tears. 
Or wrung with lonely, unimparted wo. 
Man is beside himself, not less than fall'n 
Below his dignity, who owns not woman 



THE PKLICAN ISLAND. 



As nearer to his heart than when she grew 
A rib within him, — as his heart's own heart. 

He slew the game with his unerring arroAV, 
But left it in the bush for her to drag 
Home, with her feeble hands, already burden'd 
With a young infant dinging to her shoulders. 
Here she fell down in travail by the way. 
Her piteous groans unheard, or, heard, unanswer'd ; 
There, with her convoy, she — mother, and child, 
And slaughter'd deer — became some wild beast's prey ; 
Though spoils so rich not one could long enjoy, — 
Soon the Avoods echo'd with the huge uproar 
Of savage throats contending for the bodies. 
Till not a bone was left for farther quarrel. 
— He chose the spot ; she piled the wood, she wove 
The supple withes, and bound the thatch that form'd 
The ground-built cabin, or the tree-swung nest. 
— He brain'd the drowsy panther in his den. 
At noon o'ercome by heat, and with closed lids 
Fearing assaults from none but vexing flies, 
Which, with his ring-streak'd tail he switch'd away ; 
The citadel thus storm'd, the monster slain. 
By the dread prowess of his daring arm. 
She roU'd the stones, and planted the stockade. 
To fortify the garrison for him, 
Who scornfully look'd on, at ease reclined. 
Or only rose to beat her to the task. 

Yet, midst the gall and wormwood of her lot. 
She tasted joys Avhich none but woman knows, 
— The hopes, fears, feelings, raptures of a mother. 
Well-nigh compensating for his unkindness, 
Whom yet with all her fervent soul she loved. 
Dearer to her than all the universe, 
The looks, the cries, the embraces of her babes ; 
In each of whom she Hved a separate life. 
And felt the fountain, whence their veins were fill'd. 
Flow in perpetual union with the streams 
That swell'd their pulses, and throbb'd back through hers. 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



Oh ! 'twas benign relief when ray vex'd eye 
Could turn from man, the sordid, selfish savage, 
And gaze on woman in her self-denial. 
To him and to their offspring all alive. 
Dead only to herself, — save when she won 
His unexpected smile ; then, then she look'd 
A thousand limes more beautiful, to meet 
A glance of aught like tenderness from him ; 
And sent the sunshine of her happy heart 
So warm into the charnel-house of his. 
That Nature's genuine sympathies awoke. 
And he almost forgot himself in her. 
O man ! lost man ! amidst the desolation 
Of goodness in thy soul, there yet remains 
One spark of Deity, — that spark is love. 



CANTO SEVENTH. 



Ages again, with silent revolution. 

Brought morn and even, noon and night, with all 

The old vicissitudes of Nature's aspect : 

Rains in their season fertilized the ground. 

Winds sow'd their seeds of every kind of plant 

On its peculiar soil ; while suns matured 

What winds had sown, and rains in season water'd. 

Providing nourishment for all that lived : 

Man's generations came and went like these, 

— The grass and flowers that wither where they spring; 

— The brutes that perish wholly where they fall. 

Thus while I mused on these in long succession. 
And all remain'd as all had been before, 
I cried, as I was wont, though none did listen, 
— 'Tis sweet sometimes to speak and be the hearer ; 
For he is twice himself who can converse 
With his own thoughts, as with a living throng 



Of felloAV-t ravel] ers in solitude ; 

And mine too long had been my sole companions : 

— " What is this mystery of human Ufe ? 

In rude or civilized society, 

Alike, a pilgrim's progress through this world 

To that which is to come, by the same stages ; 

With infinite diversity of fortune 

To each distinct adventurer by the way ! 

" Life is the transmigration of a soul 
Through various bodies, various states of being ; 
New manners, passions, tastes, pursuits in each ; 
In nothing, save in consciousness, the same. 
Infancy, adolescence, manhood, age. 
Are alway moving onward, alway losing 
Themselves in one another, lost at length, 
Like undulations, on the strand of death. 
The sage of threescore years and ten looks back, — 
With many a pang of fingering tenderness, 
And many a shuddering conscience-fit, — on what 
He hath been, is not, cannot be again ; 
Nor trembles less with fear and Ijope, to think 
What he is now, but cannot long continue, 
And what he must be through uncounted ages. 
— The Child ; — we know no more of happy childhood. 
Than happy childhood knows of wretched eld ; 
And all our dreams of its felicity 
Are incoherent as its own crude visions : 
We but begin to five from that fine point 
Which memory dwells on, with the morning-star, 
The earliest note we heard the cuckoo sing, 
Or the first daisy that we ever pluck'd. 
When thoughts themselves were stars, and birds, and flowers. 
Pure brilfiance, simplest music, wild perfume. 
Thenceforward, mark the metamorphoses ! 
— The Boy, the Girl ; — when all was joy, hope, promise ; 
.Yet who would be a Boy, a Girl again, 
To bear the yoke, to long for liberty, 
And dream of what will never come to pass ; 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



— The Youth, the Maiden : — living but for love, 
Yet learning soon that life hath other cares. 
And joys less rapturous, but more enduring : 
— The Woman ; — in her offspring multiplied : 
A tree of life, whose glory is her branches. 
Beneath whose shadow, she (both root and stem) 
Delights to dwell in meek obscurity. 
That they may be the pleasure of beholders : 
— The Man : — as father of a progeny, 
Whose birth requires his death to make them room. 
Yet in whose lives he feels his resurrection. 
And grows immortal in his children's children: 
— Then the gray Elder ; — leaning on his staff, 
And bow'd beneath a weight of years, that steal 
Upon him with the secrecy of sleep, 
(No snow falls lighter than the snow of age. 
None with such subtilty benumbs the frame,) 
Till he forgets sensation, and lies down 
Dead in the lap of his primeval mother ; 
She throws a shroud of turf and flowers around him. 
Then calls the worms, and bids them do their office : 
— Man giveth up the ghost, — and where is He ?" 
That startling question broke my lucubration ; 
I saw those changes realized before me ; 
Saw them recurring in perpetual line, 
The line unbroken, Avhile the thread ran on. 
Failing at this extreme, at that renew'd, 
— Like buds, leaves, blossoms, fruits on herbs and trees ; 
Like mites, flies, reptiles ; birds, and beasts, and fishes. 
Of every length of period here, — all mortal, 
And all resolved into those elements 
Whence they had emanated, whence they drew 
Their sustenance, and which their wrecks recruited 
To generate and foster other forms 
As hke themselves as were the lights of heaven. 
For ever moving in serene succession, 
— Not hke those lights unquenchable by time. 
But ever changing, like the clouds that come. 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



Who can tell whence ? and go, who can tell whither ? 

Thus the swift series of man's race elapsed, 

As for no higher destiny created 

Than aught beneath them, — from the elephant 

Down to the worm, thence to the zoophyte, 

That hnk which binds Prometheus to his rock, 

The living fibre to insensate matter. 

They were not, then they were ; the upborn, the living ! 

They were, then were not ; they had lived and died ; 

No trace, no record of their date remaining. 

Save in the memory of kindred beings. 

Themselves as surely hastening to oblivion ; 

Till, where the soil had been renew'd by rehcs, 

And earth, air, water were one sepulchre, 

Earth, air, and water might be search'd in vain, 

Atom by atom scrutinized with eyes 

Of microscopic power, that could discern 

The population of a dew-drop, yet 

No particle betray the buried secret 

Of what they had been, or of what they were : 

Life thus was swallow'd by mortahty, 

MortaUty thus swallow'd up of life, 

And man remain'd the world's unmoved possessor, 

Though every moment men appear'd and vanish'd. 

Oh ! 'twas heart-sickness to behold them thus 
Perishing without knowledge ; — perishing, 
As though they were but things of dust and ashes. 
They lived unconscious of their noblest powers, 
As were the rocks and mountains which they trod 
Of gold and jewels hidden in their bowels ; 
They lived unconscious of what lived within them, 
The deathless spirit, as were the stars that shone 
Above their heads, of their own emanations. 
And did it live within them? did there dwell 
Fire brought from heaven in forms of miry clay ? * 
Untemper'd as the slime of Babel's builders. 
And left unfinish'd like their monstrous work ? 
To me, alas ! they seem'd but living bodies, 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



With Still-born souls which never could be quicken'd, 

Till death brought immortality to light, 

And from the darkness of their earthly prison 

Placed them at once before the bar of God ; 

Then first to learn, at their eternal peril. 

The fact of his existence and their own. 

Imagination durst not follow them, 

Nor stand one moment at that dread tribunal, 

" Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right ?" 

I trembled while I spake. I could not bear 

The doubt, fear, horror, that o'erhung the fate 

Of millions, millions, millions, — living, dying. 

Without a hope to hang a hope upon. 

That of the whole it might not be affirm'd, 

— " 'Twere better that they never had been born.'" 

I turn'd away, and look'd for consolation. 

Where Nature else had shrunk with loathing back, 

Or imprecated curses, in her wrath. 

Even on the fallen creatures of my race, 

O'er whose mysterious doom my heart was breaking. 

I saw an idiot with long haggard visage, 
And eye of vacancy, trolling his tongue 
From cheek to cheek ; then muttering syllables, 
Which all the learn'd on earth could not interpret, 
Yet were they sounds of gladness, tones of pleasure, 
Ineffiible tranquillity expressing. 
Or pure and buoyant animal delight : 
For bright the sun shone round him ; cool the breeze 
Play'd in the floating shadow of the palm. 
Where he lay rolhng in voluptuous sloth : 
And he had fed deliciously on fruit. 
That fell into his lap, and virgin honey. 
That meked from the hollow of the rock. 
Whither the hum and stir of bees had drawn him. 
He knew no bliss beside, save sleep when weary, 
Or reveries like this, Avhen broad awake. 
GHmpses of thought seem'd flashing through his brain, 
Like wildfires flitting o'er the rank morass. 



Snares to the night-bewilder'd traveller ! 

Gently he raised his head, and peep'd around, 

As if he hoped to see some pleasant object, 

— The wingless squirrel jet from tree to tree, 

— The monkey pilfering a parrot's nest. 

But, ere he bore the precious spoil away. 

Surprised behind by beaks, and wings, and claws. 

That made him scamper gibbering away ; 

— ^The sly opossum dangle by her tail, 

To snap the silly birds that perch'd too near ; 

Or in the thicket, with her young at play, 

Start when the rustling grass announced a snake, 

And secrete them within her second womb. 

Then stand alert to give the intruder battle. 

Who rear'd his crest, and hiss'd, and ghd away : — 

— These with the transport of a child he view'd, 

Then laugh'd aloud, and crack'd his fingers, smote 

His palms, and clasp'd his knees, convulsed with glee ; 

A sad, sad spectacle of merriment ! 

Yet he was happy ; happy in this hfe ; 

And could I doubt, that death to him would bring 

Intelligence, which he had ne'er abused, 

A soul, which he had never lost by sin ? 

I saw a woman, panting from her throes, 
Stretch'd in a lonely cabin on the ground. 
Pale with the anguish of her bitter hour. 
Whose sorrow she forgat not in the joy 
Which mothers feel when a man-child is born ; 
Hers was an infant of her own scorn'd sex : 
It lay upon her breast ; — she laid it there. 
By the same instinct, which taught it to find 
The milky fountain, fill'd to meet its wants 
Even at the gate of life, — to drink and live. 
Awhile she lay all passive to the touch 
Of those small fingers, and the soft, soft Hps 
Soliciting the sweet nutrition thence, 
While yearning sympathy crept round her heart 
She felt her spirit yielding to the charm. 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



That wakes the parent in the fellest bosom, 
And binds her to her httle one for ever, 
If once completed ; — but she broke, she broke it, 
For she was brooding o'er her sex's wrongs, 
And seem'd to he amidst a nest of scorpions. 
That stung remorse to frenzy : — forth she sprang, 
And with collected might a moment stood, 
Mercy and misery struggling in her thoughts, 
Yet both impelling her to one dire purpose. 
There was a Httle grave already made. 
But two spans long, in the turf-floor beside her, 
By him who was the father of that child : 
Thence he had salUed, when the work was done, 
To hunt, to fish, or ramble on the hills. 
Till all was peace again within that dwelling, 
— His haunt, his den, his any thing but home ! 
Peace ? — no, till the new-comer were despatch'd 
Whence it should ne'er return, to break the stupor 
Of unawaken'd conscience in himself. 

She pluck'd the baby from her flowing breast, 
And o'er its mouth, yet moist with Nature's beverage. 
Bound a thick lotus-leaf to still its cries ; 
Then laid it down rn that untimely grave. 
As tenderly as though 'twere rock'd to sleep 
With songs of love, and she afraid to Avake it : 
Soon as she felt it touch the ground, she started. 
Hurried the damp earth over it ; then fell 
Flat on the heaving heap, and crush'd it doAvn 
With the whole burden of her grief ; exclaiming, 
" Oh that my mother had done so to me !" 
Then in a swoon forgot, a little while, 
Her child, her sex, her tyrant, and herself. 

Amazement wither'd up all human feehng ; 
I wonder'd how I could look on so calmly. 
As though I were but animated stone. 
And not kneel down upon the spot, and pray 
That earth might open to devour that mother. 
Or heaven shoot lightning to avenge that daughter : 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



But horror soon gave way to hope and pity, 
— Hope for the dead, and pity for the livinq-. 
Thenceforth when I beheld troops of wild children 
Frolicking round the tents of wickedness, 
Though my heart danced within me to the music 
Of their loud voices and unruly mirth, 
The bhthe exuberance of beginning life ! 
I could not weep when they went out hke sparks, 
That glitter, creep, and dwindle out, on tinder. 
Happy, thrice happy were they thus to die. 
Rather than grow into such men and women, 
— Such fiends incarnate as that felon-sire, 
Who dug its grave before his child was born ; 
Such miserable wretches as that mother. 
Whose tender mercies were so deadly cruel I 

I saw their infant's spirit rise to heaven, 
Caught from its birth up to the throne of God ; 
There, thousands and ten thousands, I beheld. 
Of innocents like this, that died untimely, 
By violence of their unnatural kin, 
Or by the mercy of that gracious Power, 
Who gave them being, taking what He gave 
Ere they could sin or suffer like their parents. 
I saw them in white raiment, crown'd with flowers, 
On the fair banks of that resplendent river, 
Whose streams make glad the city of our God ; 
— Water of Ufe, as clear as crystal, welhng 
Forth from the throne itself, and visiting 
Fields of a Paradise that ne'er was lost ; 
Where yet the tree of life immortal grows, 
And bears its monthly fruits, twelve kinds of fruit, 
Each in its season, food of saints and angels ; 
Whose leaves are for the heahng of the nations. 
Beneath the shadow of its blessed boughs, 
I mark'd those rescued infants, in their schools, 
By spirits of just men made perfect, taught 
The glorious lessons of almighty love, 
Which brought them thither by the readiest path 



From the world's wilderness of dire temptations, 
Securing thus their everlasting weal. 

Yea, in the rapture of that hour, though songs 
Of cherubim to golden lyres and trumpets. 
And the redcem'd upon the sea of glass. 
With voices like the sound of man 3^ waters. 
Came on mine ear, whose secret cells were open'd 
To entertain celestial harmonies, 
— The small, sweet accents of those Uttle children, 
Pouring out all the gladness of their souls 
In love, joy, gratitude, and praise to Him, 
— Him, who had loved and wash'd them in his blood : 
These were to me the most transporting strains 
Amidst the hallelujahs of all heaven. 
Though lost awhile in that amazing chorus 
Around the throne, — at happy intervals. 
The shriU hosannas of the infant-choir, 
Singing in that eternal temple, brought 
Tears to mine eye, which seraphs had been glad 
To weep, could they have felt the sympathy 
That melted all my soul, when I beheld 
How condescending Deity thus deign' d, 
Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings here, 
To perfect his high praise : — the harp of heaven 
Had lack'd its least but not its meanest string. 
Had children not been taught to play upon it. 
And sing, from feelings all their own, what men 
Nor angels can conceive of creatures, born 
Under the curse, yet from the curse redeem'd, 
And placed at once beyond the power to fall, 
— Safety which men nor angels ever knew, 
Till ranks of these and all of those had fallen. 



CANTO EIGHTH. 

'TwAS but the vision of an eye-glance ; gone 

Ere thought could fix upon it, — gone like lightning 

At midnight, when the expansive flash reveals 

Alps, Apennines, and Pyrenees, in one 

Glorious horizon, suddenly ht up, — 

Rocks, rivers, forests, — quench'd as suddenly . 

A glimpse that fill'd the mind with images. 

Which years can not obliterate ; but stamp'd 

With instantaneous, everlasting force 

On memory's more than adamantine tablet ; — 

A ghmpse of that which eye hath never seen. 

Ear heard, nor heart of man conceived. — It pass'd. 

But what it show'd can never pass. — It pass'd. 

And left me wandering through that land of exile, 

Cut off from intercourse with happier lands ; 

Abandon'd, as it seem'd, by its Creator ; 

Unvisited by Him, who came from heaven 

To seek and save the lost of every clime ; 

And where God, looking down in wrath, hath said, 

" My spirit shall no longer strive with man :" 

— So ignorance or unbelief might deem. 

Was it thus outlaw'd ? No ; God left himself 
Not without witness of his presence there ; 
He gave them rain from heaven and fruitful seasons, 
Filling unthankful hearts with food and gladness. 
He gave them kind affections, which they strangled, 
Turning his grace into lasciviousness. 
He gave them powers of intellect, to scale 
Heaven's height ; to name and number all the stars ; 
To penetrate earth's depths for hidden riches, 
Or clothe its surface with fertility ; 
Amidst the haunts of dragons, dens of satyrs. 
To call up hamlets, villages, and towns. 
The abode of peace and industry ; to build 
Cities and palaces amid waste places ; 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



To sound the ocean, combat with the A^nnds, 
Travel the waves, and compass every shore, 
On voyages of commerce or adventure ; 
To shine in civil and refining arts. 
With tranquil science elevate the soul ; 
To explore the universe of mind ; to trace 
The Nile of thinking to its secret source, 
And thence pursue its infinite meanders. 
Not lost amidst the labyrinths of Time, 
But o'er the cataract of death down rolling. 
To flow for ever, and for ever, and for ever. 
Where time nor space can limit its expansion. 

He gave the ideal, too, of truth and beauty ; — 
To look on Nature with a poet's eye. 
And Hve, amidst the daylight of this world, 
In regions of enchantment ; — with the force 
Of song, as with a spirit, to possess 
The souls of those that hearken, till they feel 
But what the minstrel feels, and do but that, 
Which his strange inspiration makes them do ; 
Thus with his breath to kindle war, and bring 
The array of battle to electric issue ; 
Or, while opposing legions, front to front, 
Wait the dread signal for the work of havoc. 
Step in between, and with the healing voice 
Of harmony and concord win them so, 
That hurling down their weapons of destruction 
They rush into each other's arms, with shouts 
And tears of transport ; till inveterate foes 
Are friends and brethren, feasting on the field. 
Where vultures else had feasted, and gorged wolves 
Howl'd in convulsive slumber o'er their corses. 

Such powers as these were given, but given in vain ; 
They knew them not, or, as they learn' d to know. 
Perverted them to more pernicious evil 
Than ignorance had skill to perpetrate. 
Yet the great Father gave a richer portion 
To these, the most impoverish'd of his children ; 




He sent the light that lighteth every man 

That comes into the world, — the hght of truth : 

But Satan turn'd that light to darkness ; turn'd 

God's truth into a lie, and they beheved 

His lie, who led them captive at his will, 

Usurp'd the throne of Deity on earth, 

And claim'd allegiance, in all hideous forms, 

— The abominable emblems of himself. 

The legion-fiend, who takes whatever shape 

Man's crazed imagination can devise 

To body forth his notion of a God, 

And prove how low immortal minds can fall. 

When from the living God they fall, to serve 

Dumb idols. Thus they worshipp'd stocks and stones, 

Which hands unapt for sculpture executed, 

In their egregious folly, like themselves. 

Though not more like, even in barbarian eyes, 

Than antic clouds resemble animals. 

To these they offer'd flowers and fruits : to those, 

Reptiles ; to others, birds, and beasts, and fishes ; 

To some they sacrificed their enemies. 

To more their children, and themselves to all. 

So had the god of this apostate world 
Blinded their eyes. But the true God had placed 
Yet further witness of his grace among them. 
When all remembrance of himself Avas lost : 
— Knowledge of good and evil, right and Avrong ; 
But knowledge was confounded, till they call'd 
Good evil, evil good ; refused the right, 
And chose and loved the wrong for its own sake. 
One witness more, his own ambassador 
On earth, the Almighty left to be their prophet, 
Whom Satan could not utterly beguile. 
Nor always hold with his ten thousand fetters, 
Lock'd in the dungeon of the obdurate breast, 
And trampled down by all its atheist inmates ; 
— Conscience, tremendous conscience, in his fits 
Of inspiration, — whencesoe'er it came. 



Rose like a ghost, inflicting fear of death 

On those who fear'd not death in fiercest battle, 

And mock'd him in their martyrdoms of torments : 

That secret, swift, and silent messenger 

Broke on them in their lonely hours, — in sleep, 

In sickness ; haunting them with dire suspicions 

Of something in themselves that would not die, 

Of an existence elseAvhere, and hereafter, 

Of which tradition was not Avholly silent. 

Yet spake not out ; its dreary oracles 

Confounded superstition to conceive, 

And baffled skepticism to reject : 

— What fear of death is like the fear beyond it ? 

But pangs like these were lucid intervals 
In the delirium of the life they led. 
And all unwelcome as returning reason. 
Which through the chaos of a maniac's brain 
Shoots gleams of light more terrible than darkness. 
These sad misgivings of the smitten heart. 
Wounded unseen by conscience from its ambush ; 
These voices from eternity, that spake 
To an eternity of soul within, — 
Were quickly lull'd by riotous enjoyment. 
Or lost in hurricanes of headlong passion. 
They knew no higher, sought no happier state ; 
Had no fine instinct of superior joys 
Than those of sense ; no taste for sense refined 
Above the gross necessities of nature. 
Or outraged Nature's most unnatural cravings. 
Why should they toil to make the earth bring forth. 
When without toil she gave them all they wanted ? 
The bread-fruit ripen'd, while they lay beneath 
Its shadow in luxurious indolence ; 
The cocoa fill'd its nuts with milk and kernels. 
While they were sauntering on the shores and mountains ; 
And while they slumber'd from their heavy meals, 
In dead forgetfulness of fife itself, 
The fish were spawning in unsounded depths. 




The birds were breeding in adjacent trees, 
The game was fattening in dehcious pastures, 
Unplanted roots were thriving under ground. 
To spread the tables of their future banquets ! 

Thus what the sires had been, the sons became, 
And generations rose, continued, went. 
Without memorial, — like the Pelicans 
On that lone island, where they built their nests, 
Nourish'd their young, and then lay down to die : 
Hence through a thousand and a thousand years, 
Man's history, in that region of oblivion. 
Might be recorded in a page as small 
As the brief legend of those Pelicans, 
With one appalling, one sublime distinction, 
(Sublime with horror, with despair appalling,) 
— That Pelicans were not transgressors ; — Man, 
Apostate from the womb, by blood a traitor. 
Thus, while he rose by dignity of birth, 
He sunk in guilt and infamy below 
Creatures, whose being was but lent, not given. 
And, when the debt was due, reclaim'd for ever. 
Oh enviable lot of innocence ! 
Their bliss and avo were only of this world : 
Whate'er their lives had been, though born to suffer 
Not less than to enjoy, their end was peace. 
Man was immortal, yet he lived and died 
As though there were no life, nor death, but this : 
Alas ! what Hfe or death may be hereafter. 
He only knows who hath ordain'd them both ; 
And they shall know who prove their truth for ever. 

The thought was agony beyond endurance ; 
" O thou, my brother Man !" again I cried, 
" Would God, that I might live, might die for thee ! 
Oh could I take a form to meet thine eyes. 
Invent a voice with words to reach thine ears ; 
Or if my spirit might converse with thine. 
And pour my thoughts, fears, feehngs, through thy breast, 
Unknown to thee whence came the strange intrusion ! 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



How would my soul rejoice, rejoice with trembling, 

To tell thee who thou art, and bring- thee home, 

• — Poor prodigal, here watching swine, and fain 

To glut thy hunger with the husks they feed on, — 

Home to our Father's house, our Father's heart ! 

Both, both are open to receive thee, — come ; 

Oh come ! — He hears not, heeds not, — O my brother ! 

That I might prophesy to thee, — to all 

The millions of dry bones that fill this valley 

Of darkness and despair ! — Alas ! alas ! 

Can these bones hve ? Lord God, Thou knowest. Come 

From the four winds of heaven, almighty breath, 

Blow on these slain, and they shall live." 

I spake, 
And turning from the mournful contemplation, 
To seek refreshment for my weary spirit. 
Amidst that peopled continent, the abode 
Of misery which reach'd beyond this world, 
I lighted on a solitary glen 
(A peaceful refuge in a land of discord) 
Crown'd with steep rocks, whose hoary summits shone 
Amid the blue unclouded element. 
O'er the green woods, that, stretching down the hills, 
Border'd the narrow champaign glade between. 
Through which a clear and pebbly rill meander'd. 
The song-birds^ caroU'd in the leafy shades. 
Those of resplendent plumage flaunted round ; 
High o'er the cliffs the sea-fowl soar'd or perch'd ; 
The Pelican and Albatross were seen 
In groups reposing on the northern ridge : 
There was entire serenity above. 
Beauty, tranquillity, delight below. 
And every motion, sound, and sight were pleasing. 
Rhinoceros nor wild bull pastured here ; 
Lion nor tiger here shed innocent blood ; 
The antelopes were grazing void of fear. 
Their young in antic gambols ramping by ; 
While goats, from precipice to precipice 



Clamber'd, or hung, or vaulted through the airj 
As if a thought convey'd them to and fro. 
Harmony rcign'd, as once ere man's creation, 
When brutes Avere yet earth's sole inhabitants. 
There were no human tracks nor dwelhngs there, 
For 'twas a sanctuary from hurtful creatures, 
And in the precincts of that happy dell 
The absence of my species was a mercy : 
Thence the declining sun withdrew his beams, 
But left it hghted by a hundred peaks, 
Glittering and golden, round the span of sky. 
That seem'd the sapphire roof of one great temple, 
Whose floor was emerald, and whose walls the hills ; 
Where those that worshipp'd God might worship Him 
In spirit and in truth, without distraction. 

Man's absence pleased me ; yet on man alone, 
Man fallen, helpless, miserable man. 
My thoughts, prayers, wishes, tears, and sorrows turn'd, 
Howe'er I strove to drive away remembrance : 
Then I refrain'd no longer, but brake out, 
— " Lord God, Avhy hast Thou made all men in vain ?" 



CANTO NINTH. 



The countenance of one advanced in years. 
The shape of one created to command. 
The step of one accustom'd to be seen. 
And follow'd with the reverence of all eyes. 
Yet conscious here of utter solitude. 
Came on me like an apparition, — whence 
I know not, — halfway down the vale already 
Had he proceeded ere I caught his eye, 
And in that mirror of intelligence, 
By the sure divination of mine art. 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



Read the mute history of his former life, 
And all the untold secrets of his bosom. 

He was a chieftain of renown ; from youth 
To green old age, the glory of his tribe. 
The terror of their enemies ; in war 
An Alexander, and in peace an Alfred, 
From morn till night he wont to yield the spear 
With indefatigable arm, or watch 
From eve till dawn in ambush for his quarry. 
Human or brute ; not less in chase than fight, 
For strength, skill, proAvess, enterprise unrivall'd. 
Fearless he grappled with the fell hysena, 
And held him strangling in the grasp of fate ; 
He seized the she-bear's whelps, and when the dam 
With miserable cries and insane rage 
Pursued to rescue them, would turn and strike 
One blow, but one, to break her heart for ever : 
From sling and bow, he sent upon death-errands 
The stone or arrow through the trackless air. 
To overtake the fleetest foot, or lay 
The loftiest pinion fluttering in the dust. 
On the rough waves he eagerly embark'd, 
Assail'd the stranded whale among the breakers. 
Dart after dart with such sure aim implanting 
In the huge carcass of the helpless victim. 
That soon in blood and foam the monster breathed 
His last, and lay a hulk upon the reef; 
Thence floated by the rising tide, and tow'd 
By a whole navy of canoes ashore. 

But 'twas the hero's mind that made him great ; 
His eye, his lip, his hand, were clothed with thunder : 
Thrones, crowns, and sceptres give not more ascendence, 
Back'd with arm'd legions, fortified with towers. 
Than this imperial savage, all alone. 
From Nature's pure beneficence derived. 
Yet, when the hey-day of hot youth was over. 
His soul grew gentle as the halcyon breeze. 
Sent from the evening-sea to bless the shore. 



After the fervours of a tropic noon ; 

Nor less benign his influence than fresh showers 

Upon the fainting wilderness, where bands 

Of pilgrims, bound for Mecca, with their camels, 

Lie down to die together in despair, 

When the deceitful mirage, that appear'd 

A pool of water trembling in the sun. 

Hath vanish'd from the bloodshot eye of thirst. 

Firm in defence as vahant in the battle. 

Assailing none, but all assaults repelling 

With such determined chastisement, that foes 

No longer dared to forage on his borders, 

War shrunk from his dominions ; simple laws, 

Yet wise and equitable, he ordain'd 

To rule a willing and obedient people. 

Blood ceased to flow in sacrifice ; no more 

The parent's hands were raised against their children, 

Children no longer slew their aged parents ; 

Man prey'd not on his fellow-man, within 

The hallow'd circle of his patriarch-sway. 

That seem'd amidst barbarian clans around 

A garden in a waste of brier and hemlock. 

Ere life's meridian, thus that chief had reach'd 
The utmost pinnacle of savage grandeur. 
And stood the envy of ignoble eyes. 
The awe of humbler mortals, the example 
Of youth's sublime ambition ; but to him, 
It was not given to rest at any height ; 
The thoughts that travel to eternity 
Already had begun their pilgrimage, 
Which time, nor change, nor hfe, nor death, could stop. 
All that he saw, heard, felt, or could conceive, 
Open'd new scenes of mental enterprise. 
Imposed new tasks for arduous contemplation. 
On the steep eminence which he had scaled. 
To rise or fall were sole alternatives ; 
He might not stand, and he disdain'd to fall ; 
Innate magnificence of mind upheld. 



And buoyancy of genius bore him on. 
Heaven, earth, and ocean, were to him familiar 
In all their motions, aspects, changes ; each 
To him paid tribute of the knowledge, hid 
From uninquiring ignorance ; to him 
Their gradual secrets, though with slow reserve, 
Yet sure accumulation, all reveal'd. 

But whence they came, even more than what they were, 
Awaken'd wonder, and defied conjecture ; 
Blank wonder could not satisfy his soul. 
And resolute conjecture would not yield, 
Though foil'd a thousand times, in speculation 
On themes that open'd immortality. 
The gods whom his deluded countrymen 
Acknowledged, were no gods to him ; he scom'd 
The impotence of skill that carved such figures. 
And pitied the fatuity of those 
Who saw not in the abortions of their hands 
The abortions of their minds. — 'Twas the Creator 
He sought through every volume open to him, 
From the small leaf that holds an insect's web. 
From which ere long a colony shall issue. 
With wings and limbs as perfect as the eagle's, 
To the stupendous ocean, that gives birth 
And nourishment to everlasting millions 
Of creatures, great and small, beyond the power 
Of man to comprehend how they exist. 
One thought amidst the multitude within him 
Press'd with perpetual, with increasing weight, 
And yet the elastic soul beneath its burden 
Wax'd strong and stronger, was enlarged, exalted, 
With the necessity of bearing up 
Against annihilation : for that seem'd 
The only refuge were this hope forgone : 
It was as though he wrestled with an angel. 
And would not let him go without a blessing, 
If not extort the secret of his name ; 
This was that thought, that hope ; — dumb idols. 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



And the vain homage of their worshippers, 
Were proofs to him, not less than sun and stars, 
That there were beings mightier far tlian man, 
Or man had never dream'd of aught above him : 
'Twas clear to him as was his own existence. 
In which he felt the fact personified, 
That man himself was for this world too mighty, 
Possessing powers which could not ripen here, 
But ask'd infinity to bring them forth. 
And find employ for their unbounded scope. 

Tradition told him, that, in ancient time. 
Sky, sun, and sea were all the universe ; 
The sun grew tired of gazing on the sea. 
Day after day ; then, with descending beams. 
Day after day he pierced the dark abyss. 
Till he had reach'd its diamantine floor ; 
Whence he drew up an island, as a tree 
Grows in the desert from some random seed, 
Dropt by a wild bird. Grain by grain it rose, 
And touch'd at length the surface ; there expanding 
Beneath the fostering influence of his eye. 
Prolific seasons, light, and showers, and dew. 
Aided by earthquakes, hurricanes, volcanoes 
(All agents of the universal sun). 
Conspired to form, advance, enrich, and break 
The level reef, till hills and dales appear'd. 
And the small isle became a continent. 
Whose bounds his ancestors had never traced. 
Thither in time, by means inscrutable. 
Plants, animals, and man himself was brought ; 
And with the idolaters the gods they served. 
These tales tradition told him ; he believed. 
Though all were fables, yet they shadoAv'd truth ; 
That truth with heart, soul, mind, and strength he sought. 
Oh 'twas a spectacle for angels, bound 
On embassies of mercy to this earth. 
To gaze on with compassion and delight, 
— Yea, with desire that they might be his helpers, — 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



To see a dark, endungeon'd spirit roused, 
And struggling into glorious liberty, 
Though Satan's legions watch'd at every portal. 
And held him by ten thousand manacles ! 

Such was the being whom I here descried. 
And fix'd my earnest expectation on him ; 
For now or never might my hope be proved. 
How near, by searching, man might find out God. 

Thus, while he walk'd along that peaceful valley. 
Though rapt in meditation far above 
The world which met his senses, but in vain 
Would charm his spirit within its magic circle, 
— Still Avith benign and meek simplicity 
He hearken'd to the prattle of a babe. 
Which he was leading by the hand ; but scarce 
Could he restrain its eagerness to break 
Loose, and run wild Avith joy among the bnshes. 
It was his grandson, now the only stay 
Of his bereaved affections ; all his kin 
Had fall'n before him, and his youngest daughter 
Bequeath'd this infant with her dying lips : 
" Oh take this child, my father ! take this child, 
And bring it up for me ; so may it Uve 
To be the latest blessing of thy hfe." 
He took the child ; he brought it up for her ; 
It was the latest blessing of his life ; 
And while his soul explored immensity. 
In search of something undefinedly great. 
This infant was the link which bound that soul 
To this poor world, where he had not a Avish 
Or hope, beyond the moment, for himself. 

The little one was dancing at his side. 
And dragging him with petty violence 
Hither and thither from the onward path. 
To find a bird's nest or to hunt a fly : 
His feign'd resistance and unfeign'd reluctance 
But made the boy more resolute to rule 
The grandsire with his fond caprice. The sage, 




Though dallying with the minion's wayward will, 

His own preiTieditatod course pursued, 

And while, in tones of sportive tenderness, 

He answer'd all its questions, and ask'd others 

As simple as its own, yet wisely framed 

To wake and prove an infant's faculties ; 

As though its mind were some sweet instrument. 

And he, with breath and touch, were finding out 

AVhat stops or keys would yield the richest music : 

— All this was by-play to the scene within 

The busy theatre of his own breast. 

Keen and absorbing thoughts were working there. 

And his heart travail'd with unutter'd pangs ; 

Sigh after sigh, escaping to his Hps, 

Was check'd, or turn'd into some lively word, 

To hide the bitter conflict from his child. 

At length they struck into the woods, and thence 
Chmb'd the gray rocks aloof. There from his crag. 
At their abrupt approach, the startled eagle 
Took wing above their heads ; the boy alarm'd, 
— Nor less delighted when no peril came, — 
Follow'd its flight with eyes and hands upraised 
And bounding forward on the verdant slope, 
Watch'd it diminish, till a gnat, that cross'd 
His sight, eclipsed it : when he look'd again 
'Twas gone, and for an instant he felt sad. 
Till some new object Avon his gay attention. 
His grandsire stepp'd to take the eagle's stand, 
And gaze at freedom on the boundless prospect, 
But started back, and held his breath with awe, 
So suddenly, so gloriously it broke 
From heaven, earth, sea, and air, at once upon him. 
The tranquil ocean roll'd beneath his feet ; 
The shores on each hand lessen'd from the view ; 
The landscape glow'd with tropical luxuriance ; 
The sky was fleck'd with gold and crimson clouds. 
That seem'd to emanate from nothing there. 
Born in the blue and infinite expanse, 



Where just before the eye might seek in vain 
An evening shadow as a dayh'ght star. 

There stood the patriarch amidst a scene 
Of splendour and beatitude ; himself 
A diadem of glory o'er the whole, 
For none but he could comprehend the beauty, 
The bliss diffused throughout the universe ; 
Yet hoUer beauty, higher bliss he sought. 
Of which that universe was but the veil. 
Wrought with inexplicable hieroglyphics. 
Here then he stood, alone but not forsaken 
Of Him, Avithout whose leave a sparrow falls not. 
Wide open lay the Book of Deity, 
The page was Providence : but none, alas ! 
Had taught him letters ; when he look'd, he wept 
To feel himself forbidden to peruse it. 
— " Oh for'a messenger of mercy now. 
Like Philip, when he join'd the Eunuch's chariot ! 
Oh for the privilege to burst upon him, 
And show the Wind, the dead, the hght of hfe !" 

I hush'd the exclamation, for he seem'd 
To hear it ; turn'd his head, and look'd all round, 
As if an eye invisible beheld him, 
A voice had spoken out of sohtude : 
— Yea, such an eye beheld him, such a voice 
Had spoken ; but they were not mine : his life 
He would have yielded on the spot, to see 
That eye ; to hear that voice, and understand it : 
It was the eye of God, the voice of Nature. 
All in a moment on his knees he fell ; 
And with imploring arms, outstretch'd to heaven, 
And eyes no longer wet with hopeless tears, 
But beaming forth sublime intelligence ; 
In words through which his heart's pulsation throbb'd. 
And made mine tremble to their accents, — pray'd : 
— " Oh ! if there be a Power above all power, 
A Light above all light, a Name aboA'^e 
All other names, in heaven and earth ; that Power, 




That Light, that Name I call upon." — He paused, 

Bow'd his hoar head with reverence, closed his eyes, 

And with clasp'd hands upon his breast, began 

In under tones, that rose in fervency. 

Like incense kindled on a holy altar. 

Till his whose soul became one tongue of fire, 

Of which these words were faint and poor expressions 

— " Oh ! if Thou art. Thou knowest that I am : 

Behold me, hear me, pity me, despise not 

The prayer, which — if Thou art — Thou hast inspired. 

Or wherefore seek I now a God unknown ? 

And feel for Thee, if haply I may find 

In whom I live and move and have my being ? 

Reveal Thyself to me ; reveal thy power, 

Thy hght, thy name — that I may fear, adore, 

Obey, — and, oh ! that I might love Thee too ! 

For, if Thou art — it must be — Thou art good ; 

And I would be the creature of thy goodness : 

Oh ! hear and answer : — let me know Thou hearest ! 

— Know that as surely as thou art, so surely 

My prayer and supplication are accepted." 

He waited silently ; there came no answer : 
The roaring of the tide beneath, the gale 
Rustling the forest-leaves, the notes of birds, 
And hum of insects, — these were all the sounds. 
That met familiarly around his ear. 
He look'd abroad ; there shone no light from heaven 
But that of sunset ; and no shapes appear'd 
But glistering clouds, which melted through the sky 
As imperceptibly as the}^ had come ; 
While all terrestrial objects seem'd the same 
As he had ever known them ; — still he look'd 
And hsten'd, till a cold sick feeling sunk 
Into his heart, and blighted every hope. 

Anon faint accents, from the sloping lawn 
Beneath the crag where he was kneehng, rose. 
Like supernatural echoes of his prayer : 
— "A Name above all names — I call upon. — 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



Thou art — Thou knowest that I am : — Reveal 

Thyself to me ; — but, oh ! that I may love Thee ! 

For if Thou art, Thou must be good : — Oh ! hear, 

And let me know thou hearest !" — Memory fail'd 

The child ; for 'twas his grandchild, though he knew not, 

— In the deep transport of his mind he knew not 

That voice, to him the sweetest of ten thousand. 

And known the best because the best beloved. 

Again it cried : — " Thou art — Thou must be good : 

— Oh ! hear, 
And let me know thou hearest." — Memory fail'd 
The child, but feehng fail'd not ; tears of light 
Slid down his cheek ; he too was on his knees. 
Clasping his little hands upon his heart. 
Unconscious why, yet doing what he saw 
His grandsire do, and saying what he said. 
For while he gather'd buds and flowers, to twine 
A garland for the old gray hairs, whose locks 
Were loveUer in his sight than all the blooms 
On which the bees and butterflies were feasting, 
The Patriarch's agony of spirit caught 
His eye, his ear, his heart ; he dropt the flowers. 
And kneehng down among them, wept and pray'd 
Like him, with whom he felt such strange emotions 
As rapt his infant-soul to heavenly heights ; 
Though whence they sprang, and what they meant, he 

knew not ; 
But they were good, and that was all to him, 
Who wonder'd why it was so sweet to weep ; 
Nor would he quit his humble attitude. 
Nor cease repeating fragments of that lesson. 
Thus learnt spontaneously from lips, whose words 
Were almost dearer to him than their kisses. 
When on his lap the old man dandled him. 
And told him simple stories of his mother. 

Recovering thought, the venerable sire 
Beheld, and recognised his darling boy. 
Thus beautiful and innocent, engaged 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



In the same worship with himself. His heart 
Leap'd at the sight : he flung away despondence, 
While joy unspeakable and full of glory 
Broke through the pagan darkness of his soul. 
He ran and snatch'd the infant in his arms, 
Embraced him passionately, wept aloud, 
And cried, scarce knowing what he said, — " My Son ! 
My Son ! there is a God ! there is a God !" — 
"And, oh ! that I may love Thee too !" rejoin'd 
The child, Avhose tongue could find no other words 
Than prayer ; — " for if Thou art. Thou must be good.' 
— " He is ! He is ! and we will love Him too ! 
Yea, and be like Him, — good, for He is good !" 
Replied the ancient father in amazement. 

Then wept they o'er each other, till the child 
Exceeded, and the old man's heart reproved him 
For lack of reverence in the excess of joy : 
The ground itself seem'd holy ! heaven and earth 
Full of the presence, felt, not seen, of Him, 
The Power above all power, the Light above 
All hght, the Name above all other names ; 
Whom he had call'd upon, whom he had found. 
Yet worshipp'd only as " the Unknown God," — 
That nearest step which uninstructed man 
Can take, from Nature up to Deity. 
To Him, again, standing erect, he pray'd, 
And while he pray'd, high in his arms he held 
That dearest treasure of his heart, the child 
Of his last dying daughter, — 'now the sole 
Hope of his hfe, and orphan of his house. 
He held him as an offering up to heaven, 
A Hving sacrifice unto the God 
Whom he invoked : — " O Thou who art !" he cried, 
" And hast reveal'd that mystery to me, 
Hid from all generations of my fathers. 
Or, if once known, forgotten and perverted ; 
I may not live to learn Thee better here ; 
But oh ! let this my son, mine only son. 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



Whom thus I dedicate to Thee ; — let him, 

Let him be taught thy will, and choose 

Obedience to it ; — may he fear thy power. 

Walk in thy light, now dawning out of darkness ; 

And, oh ! my last, last prayer, — to him reveal 

The unutterable secret of thy name !" 

He paused ; then with the transport of a seer 

Went on : — " That Name may all my nation know ; 

And all that hear it worship at the sound, 

When thou shalt with a voice from heaven proclaim it ; 

And so it surely shall be." — 

" For thou art ; 
And if Thou art. Thou must be good !" exclaim'd 
The child, yet panting Avith the breath of prayer. 

They ceased ; then Avent rejoicing down the mountains. 
Through the cool glen, where not a sound was heard, 
Amidst the dark solemnity of eve, 
But the loud purling of the little brook. 
And the low murmur of the distant ocean. 
Thence to their home beyond the hills in peace 
They walk'd; and when they reach'd their humble threshold. 
The glittering firmament was full of stars. 
— He died that night ; his grandchild hved to see 
The patriarch's prayer and prophecy fulfiU'd. 

Here end my song ; here ended not the vision : 
I heard seven thunders uttering their voices, 
And wrote what they did utter ; but 'tis seal'd 
Within the volume of my heart, where thoughts 
Unbodied yet in vocal words await 
The quickening warmth of poesy, to bring 
Their forms to light, — like secret characters. 
Invisible till open'd to the fire ; 
Or like the potter's paintings, colourless 
Till they have pass'd to glory through the flames. 
Changes more wonderful than those gone by. 
More beautiful, transporting, and suUime, 
To aU the frail affections of our nature, 
To all the immortal faculties of man ; 



THE PELICAN ISLAND. 



Such changes did I witness ; not alone 
In one poor PeUcan Island, nor on one 
Barbarian continent, where man himself 
Could scarcely soar above the PeHcan : 
— The world as it hath been in ages past, 
The world as now it is, the world to come, 
Far as the eye of prophecy can pierce ; — 
These I beheld, and still in memory's rolls 
They have their pages and their pictures ; these, 
Another day, a nobler song may show. 

Vain boast ! another day may not be given ; 
This song may be my last ; for I have reach'd 
That slippery descent, whence man looks back 
With melancholy joy on all he cherish'd ; 
Around, with love unfeign'd, on all he's losing : 
Forward, with hope that trembles while it turns 
To the dim point where all our knowledge ends. 
I am but one among the Jiving; one 
Among the dead I soon shall be ; and one 
Among unnumber'd millions yet unborn ; 
The sum of Adam's mortal progeny. 
From Nature's birthday to her dissolution : 
— Lost in infinitude, my atom-life 
Seems but a sparkle of the smallest star. 
Amidst the scintillations of ten thousand. 
Twinkling incessantly ; no ray returning 
To shine a second moment, where it shone 
Once, and no more for ever : — so I pass. 
The world grows darker, lonelier, and more silent, 
As I go down into the vale of years ; 
For the grave's shadows lengthen in advance. 
And the grave's loneliness appals my spirit, 
And the grave's silence sinks into my heart. 
Till I forget existence in the thought 
Of non-existence, buried for a while 
In the still sepulchre of my own mind. 
Itself imperishable : — ah ! that word. 
Like the archangel's trumpet, wakes me up 




To deathless resurrection. Heaven and earth 
Shall pass away, but that which thinks within me 
Must think for ever ; that which feels must feel : 
— I am, and I can never cease to be. 

Oh thou that readest ! take this parable 
Home to thy bosom ; think as I have thought, 
And feel as I have felt, through all the changes, 
Which Time, Life, Death, the world's great actors, wrought, 
While centuries swept hke morning dreams before me. 
And thou shalt find this moral to my song : 
— Thou art, and thou canst never cease to be : 
What then are time, life, death, the world to thee ? 
I may not answer ; ask Eternity. 




I 



THE CHRONICLE OF ANGELS. 



347 



THE CHRONICLE OF ANGELS. 

The following Poem having been suggested by tlie perusal of a manuscript 
treatise on "The Holy Angels," by the Author's late highly esteemed friend, 
R. C. Brackenbury, of Raithby, is most respectfully inscribed to IVIrs. Brack- 
enbury. 

PART I. 

All that of angels God to man makes known, 
Here by the light of his clear word is shown. 
'Tis Jacob's dream ; — behold the ladder rise, 
Resting on earth, but reaching to the skies. 
Where faith the radiant hierarchies may trace 
Abroad in nature, providence, and grace, 
Descending and returning by that path. 
On embassies of mercy or of wrath ; 
Here the stone pillow and the desert-sod 
Become the gate of heaven, the house of God ; 
— Put off thy shoes, approach with awe profound, 
The place on which thou stand'st is holy ground. 

Spirit made perfect, spirit of the just ! 
Thy hand which traced these leaves is fall'n to dust, 
Yet, in the visions of eternity. 
Things unconceived by mortals thou canst see, 
— Angels, as angels stand before the throne. 
By thee are without veil or sj^mbol known : 
Oh ! couldst thou add one brilliant page, and tell 
What those pure beings are who never fell, 
— Those first-born sons of God, ere time began, 
Though elder, greater, not more loved than man, 
Thrones, principalities, dominions, powers. 
Cherub or seraph, midst empyreal bowers. 
Who in themselves their Maker only see. 
And live, and move, and d^vell in Deity : 
— But 'tis forbidden ; — earthly eye nor ear 
Heaven's splendours may behold, heaven's secrets hear ; 

Ob. I. 30 3l9 



THE CHRONICLE OF ANGELS. 



To flesh and blood that world to come is seal'd, 
Or but in hieroglyphic shades reveal'd. 

We follow thee, bloss'd saint ! our tongues, ere long, 
May learn from thine the church-triumphant's song ; 
For well, I ween, thy minstrel soul of fire 
Can compass all the notes of Raphael's lyre ; 
— That soul, which once, beneath the body's cloud. 
Sang, like an unseen sky-lark, sweet and loud ; 
Louder and sweeter now thy raptures rise, 
Where cloud nor sun are seen in purer skies. 

But what of angels know we ? — Search that book 
On which the eyes of angels love to look, 
Desiring, through its opening seals, to trace 
The heights and depths of that transcendent grace, 
Which frona the Father's bosom sent the Son, 
Himself the ransom for a world undone. 

First, with the morning stars when nature sprang. 
These sons of God for joy together sang ; 
Diviner wonders day by day explored, 
Night after night with deeper awe adored ; 
Till, o'er his finish'd work, Jehovah placed 
Man, with the stamp of his own image graced : 
Even angels paused a moment then to gaze, 
Ere burst from all their choirs such shouts of praise, 
As not in heaven at their own birth were knoAvn, 
Nor heard when Satan's host were overthrowTi. 

When man lost Eden for his first offence, 
The swords of cherubim expell'd him thence. 
Those flaming signs of heaven with earth at strife 
Turn'd every way to guard the tree of life. 

Angels, thenceforth, who in God's presence stand, 
As ministering spirits, travel sea and land ; 
Onward or upward, rapt through air and sky. 
From heaven to earth, from earth to heaven they fly ; 
Like rays diverging from the central sun, 
Which through the darkness of creation run, 
Enlightening moons and planets in their course, 
And thence reflected seek their glorious source. 



THE CHRONICLE OF ANGELS. 



PART II. 

When Abraham dwelt in Mamre angels spoke, 

As friend to friend, with him beneath the oak : 

With flocks and herds, with wealth and servants blest, 

Of almost more than heart could wish possest, 

One want the old man felt, — an hopeless one ! 

Oh ! what Avas all he had without a son ? 

Heaven's messengers brought tidings to his ear. 

Which nature, dead in him, found hard to hear ; 

Which faith itself could scarce receive for joy, 

But he believed, — and soon embraced a boy ; 

Nor, while the hne of Adam shall extend. 

Will faithful Abraham's promised issue end. 

Hence, when his lifted arm the death-stroke aim'd 
At him, whom God mysteriously reclaim'd, 
At him, whom God miraculously gave. 
An angel cried from heaven the youth to save. 
And he who found a son when he beheved, 
That son again as from the dead received. 

When Hagar, wo-begone and desolate, 
Alone, beside the desert fountain sate. 
And o'er her unborn babe shed bitter tears, 
The angel of the Lord allay'd her fears, 
And pledged in fee to her unportion'd child 
The hon's range o'er Araby the wild : 
" Here have I look'd for Him whom none can see !" 
She cried ; — " and found, for thou, God, seest me !" 
— Again, when fainting in the wilderness. 
An angel-watcher pitied her distress. 
To Ishmael's lips a hidden well unseal'd. 
And the long wanderings of his race reveal'd. 
Who still, as hunters, warriors, spoilers, roam. 
Their steeds their riches, sands and sky their home. 
Angels o'erthrew the cities of the plain, 
With fire and brimstone in tempestuous rain. 



And from the wrath which heartless sinners braved, 

Lot, with the violence of mercy, saved ; 

Now where the region breathed with life before, 

Stands a dead sea where life can breathe no more. 

When Jacob, journeying with his feeble bands. 

Trembled to fall into a brother's hands ; 

At twilight, lingering in the rear, he saw 

God's host's around his tents their 'campment draw : 

— While, with a stranger, in mysterious strife. 

Wrestling till break of day for more than Hfe ; 

He pray'd, he wept, he cried in his distress, 

" I will not let thee go except thou bless !" 

Lame Avith a touch, he halted on his thigh. 

Yet like a prince had power with God Most High. 

Nine plagues in vain had smitten Pharaoh's land, 
Ere the destroying angel stretch'd his hand, 
Whose sword, wide flashing through Egyptian gloom. 
Lighted and struck their first-born to the tomb ; 
Through all the realm a cry at midnight spread. 
For not a house was found without one dead. 

When Balaam, blinded by the lure of gold. 
To curse Avhom God would bless, his heart had sold, 
A wrathful angel, with high brandish'd blade. 
Invisible to him, his progress stay'd. 
Nor till, with human voice, his own dumb ass 
Rebuked the prophet's madness, let him pass. 

When Joshua led the tribes o'er Jordan's flood, 
The captain of God's host before him stood. 
He fell, and own'd, adoring on his face, 
A power whose presence sanctified the place. 

When Deborah from beneath her palm-tree rose, 
GoD into woman's hands sold Israel's foes ; 
They fought from heaven, — 'twas heaven deliverance 
Stars in their courses against Sisera fought. [wrought. 

They sinn'd again, and fell beneath the yoke ; 
To Gideon then their guardian angel spoke ; 
Three hundred warriors chosen at the brook. 
Pitchers for arms, Avith lamps and trumpets took ; 



I 



THE CHRONICLE OB- ANGELS. 



They brake the vessels, raised the lights, and blew 

A blast which Midian's startled hosts o'erthrew ; 

Foe fell on foe, and friend his friend assail'd ; 

— The sword of God and Gideon thus prevail'd. 

When David's heart was lifted up with pride, 

And more on multitudes than God relied, 

Three days, an angel arm'd with pestilence. 

Smote down the people for the Icing's offence ; 

Yet when his humbled soul for Israel, pray'd, 

Heaven heard his groaning, and the plague was stay'd : 

He kneel'd between the living and the dead. 

Even as the sword came down o'er Zion's head ; 

Then went th' Almighty's voice throughout the land, 

" It is enough ; avenger ! rest thine hand." 

Elijah, with his mantle, smote the flood. 
And Jordan's hastening waves divided stood ; 
The fiery chariot, on the further shore, 
Deathless to heaven th' ascending prophet bore : 
" My father !" cried Ehsha, as he flew ; 
" Lo ! Israel's chariot and his horsemen too :" 
Then with the mantle, as it dropp'd behind, 
Came down a power, like mighty rushing wind, 
And as he wrapt the trophy round his breast, 
Elijah's spirit Elisha's soul possess'd. 
— He, when the Syrian bands, as with a net 
Of living links, close draAvn, his home beset, 
Pray'd, — and his trembling servant saw amazed. 
How Dothan's mountain round the prophet blazed ; 
Chariots of fire and horses throng'd the air, 
And more were for them than against them there. 

When pale Jerusalem heard Sennacherib's boast, 
How, in their march of death, his locust host 
Swept field and forest, rivers turn'd aside, 
Crush'd idols, and the living God defied, 
— While fear within the walls sad vigils kept. 
And the proud foe without securely slept. 
At midnight, through the camp, as with a blast. 
Hot from Arabian sands, an angel pass'd ; 



1 



THE CHRONICLE OF ANGELS. 



And when the city rose at dawn of day, 
An army of dead men around it lay ! 

Down in the raging furnace, bound they fell, 
Three Flebrew youths, — Avhen, lo ! a miracle ; 
At large, amidst the sevenfold flames they walk'd, 
And, as in Eden, with an angel talk'd ; 
Up rose the king, astonied and in haste ; 
" Three men," he cried, into the fires we cast ; 
Four I behold, — and in the fourth, the mien 
And semblance of the Son of God are seen." 

While Daniel lay beneath the lion's paws. 
And angels shut the death-gates of their jaws. 
Which, ere his headlong foes had reach'd the floor, 
Crush'd all their bones, and revell'd in their gore. 

Angels to prophets things to come reveal'd, 
And things yet unfulfill'd in symbols sealed, 
When in deep visions of the night they lay, 
And hail'd the dawn of that millennial day. 
For which the church looks out with earnest eye. 
And counts the moments as the hour draws nigh. 

Thus angels oft to man's rebellious race, 
Were ministers of vengeance or of grace ; 
And, in the fulness of the time decreed. 
Glad heralds of the woman's promised seed. 



PART III. 

To Zacharias, with his spouse grown old, 
John the forerunner's course an angel told ; 
Struck dumb for unbelief, the father's tongue 
At the babe's birth for joy brake loose and sung. 

To Mary, highly favour'd, Gabriel brought 
An embassy of love transcending thought ; 
With fear and meekness, hearkening to his word, 
"Behold," said she, "the handmaid of the Lord." 




When Christ was born, that messenger once more 
Good tidings to the Bethlehem shepherds bore ; 
When suddenly with him th' angeUc throngs 
Turn'd night to morning, earth to heaven Avith songs. 

When Herod sought the young child's life, — by night, 
An angel warn'd his foster-sire to flight ; 
But when the murderer's race of blood was run, 
Jehovah out of Egypt call'd his Son, 

When by the Spirit to the desert led. 
Our Saviour had not where to lay his head ; 
With hunger, thirst, fatigue, and watching worn. 
When he the tempter's dire assaults had borne. 
Still with the written word his wiles repell'd, 
Though long in that mysterious conflict held. 
Till the foil'd fiend at length shrunk back with shame, 
— Angels to minister unto him came. 

In lone Gethsemane's most dolorous shade, 
When in such agony of soul he pray'd, 
That like great blood-drops falling to the ground 
Burst the dark sweat from every pore around, 
An angel, — from twelve legions marshall'd nigh. 
Who waited but the signal of his eye, — 
Cast o'er the Son of God his shadowing wing, 
To strengthen him whom angels call their King. 

Round the seal'd sepulchre where Jesus slept. 
Angels their watch till the third morning kept ; 
They hail'd the earthquake, they beheld him rise. 
Death's victim, now death's victor, to the skies. 

While woman's faithful love the tomb survey'd 
In which her hands his lifeless limbs had laid ; 
With lightning looks, and raiment snowy-white, 
At whom as dead the guards fell down in fright, 
A mighty angel, — he who roll'd the stone 
From the cave's mouth, — the Lord's uprise made known. 

Angels, to his disciples, while they saw 
Their glorious Master in a cloud withdraw, 
Ascend and vanish through th' expanding skies. 
And follow'd him with failing hearts and eyes, 



THE CHRONICLE OF ANEGLS. 



Foretold his second advent, in that day 

When heaven and earth themselves shall pass away. 

Angels unseen, as ministering spirits went, 
When forth the chosen witnesses were sent, 
With power from high to preach, where'er they trod, 
The glorious gospel of the blessed God. 
Angels made straight their paths o'er land and sea. 
Threw wide their prison-doors and let them free, 
Smote slaughter-breathing Herod on his throne, 
Led Philip where the Eunuch sat alone, 
Taught meek Cornelius, from what hps his ear 
Might "words whereby he must be saved" hear; 
And stood by fearless Paul, when, tempest-driven, 
The whole ship's company to him were given. 

Good angels still conduct, from age to age. 
Salvation's heirs, on nature's pilgrimage ; 
Cherubic swords, no longer signs of strife, 
Now point the way, and keep the tree of life ; 
Seraphic hands, with coals of living fire. 
The hps of God's true messengers inspire ; 
Angels, who see their heavenly Father's face. 
Watch o'er his little ones with special grace ; 
Still o'er repenting sinners they rejoice. 
And blend their myriad voices as one voice. 

Angels, with heahng virtue in their wings. 
Trouble dead pools, unsluice earth's bosom-springs. 
Till fresh as new-born hfe the waters roll ; 
Lepers and lame step in and are made whole. 

Angels, the saints from noonday perils keep. 
And pitch their tents around them while they sleep ; 
Uphold them when they seem to walk alone. 
Nor let them dash their feet against a stone ; 
They teach the dumb to speak, the blind to see. 
Comfort the dying in their agony. 
And to the rest of paradise convey 
Spirits enfranchised from the crumbling clay. 

Strong angels, arm'd by righteous Providence, 
Judgments on guilty nations still dispense, 



I 



THE CHRONICLE OF ANGELS. 



Pour out their full-charged vials of despair 
And death, o'er sun, and sea, and earth, and air ; 
Or sound their trumpets, while at every blast, 
Plague follows plague, wo treads on wo gone past. 

Bright angels, through mid-heaven shall hold their flight 
Till all that sit in darkness see the light. 
Still the good tidings of great joy proclaim, 
Till every tongue confess a Saviour's name. 

Th' archangel's voice, the trump of God, the cry 
Of startled nature, rending earth and sky, 
Shall change the living, raise the dead, and bring 
All nations to the presence of their King, 
Whose flaming ministers, on either hand, 
Ten thousand times ten thousand angels stand, 
To witness time's full roll for ever seal'd. 
And that eternity to come reveal' d, 
— That era in the reign of Deity, 
When sin, the curse, and death no more can be. 
Angels who fell not, men who fell restored, 
Shall then rejoice in glory with the Lord : 
— Hearts, harps and voices, in one choir shall raise 
The new, the old, th' eternal song of praise. 

May ye who read, with him who wrote this strain, 
Join in that song, and worship in that train ! 



SONGS 

ON 

THE ABOLITION OF NEGRO SLAVERY. 



NO. I. THE RAINBOW. 

Sign of the passing storm, 

Symbol of wrath gone by, 
Born of the cloud and sun, — what form 

Of beauty tracks the sky ? 
From Afric to the isles of slaves 
The rainbow spans th' Atlantic waves. 

Black, white, and bond, and free. 
Castes and proscriptions cease ; 

The Negro wakes to liberty, 
The Negro sleeps in peace ; 

Read the great charter on his brow, 

" I AM a MAN, a BROTHER HOW." 



NO. II. THE NEGRO IS FREE. 

[To Moore's melody of "Sound the loud timbrel o'er Egypt's dark sea."] 

Blow ye the trumpet abroad o'er the sea ; 
Britannia hath conquer'd, the Negro is free : 
Sing, for the pride of the tyrant is broken. 

His scourges and fetters, all clotted with blood, 
Are wrench'd from his grasp, for the word was but spoken. 

And fetters and scourges were plunged in the flood : 
Blow ye the trumpet abroad o'er the sea, 
Britannia hath conquer'd, the Negro is free. 

OL. I. 31 361 



SONGS ON THE ABOLITION 



Hail to Britannia, fair liberty's isle ! 

Her frown quail'd the tyrant, the slave caught her smile 

Fly on the winds, to toll Afric the story ; 

Say to the mother of mourners, " Rejoice I" 
Britannia went forth, in her beauty, her glory, 

And slaves sprang to men at the sound of her voice : 
— Praise to the God of our fathers ; 'twas He, 
Jehovah, that conquer'd, my country ! by thee. 



NO. III. SLAVERY THAT WAS. 

Ages, ages have departed 

Since the first dark vessel bore 

Afric's children, broken-hearted, 
To the Caribbean shore ; 

She like Rachel, 
Weeping, for they were no more. 

Millions, millions have been slaughter'd 
In the fight and on the deep ; 

Millions, millions more have water'd. 
With such tears as captives weep. 

Fields of travail, 
Where their bones till doomsday sleep. 

Mercy, mercy vainly pleading, 

Rent her garments, smote her breast, 

Till a voice, from heaven proceeding, 
Gladden'd all the gloomy west, 

" Come, ye weary ! 
Come, and I will give you rest !" 

Tidings, tidings of salvation ! 

Britons rose with one accord. 
Purged the plague-spot from our nation, 

Negroes to their rights restored ; 
Slaves no longer. 

Free-men, — Free-men of the Lord 



I 




NO. IV. SLAVERY THAT IS NOT. 

God made all his creatures free ; 
Life itself is liberty ; 
God ordain'd no other bands 
Than united hearts and hands. 

Sin th' eternal charter broke, 

— Sin, itself earth's heaviest yoke ; 

Tyranny with sin began, 

Man o'er brute, and man o'er man. 

Pass five thousand pagan years 
Of creation's groans and tears ; 
To oppression's climax come. 
In the crimes of Christendom. 

What were these ? — Let Afric's sands, 

Ocean's depths, West Lidian strands, 

In the day of wrath declare : 

— Oh '. the mercy that they were ;— 

For they are. not, — cannot be ; 

Life again is hberty ; 

And the Negro's only bands 

Love-knit hearts, and love-link'd hands. 

So the plague of slavery cease ! 
So return primeval peace ! 
While the ransom'd tribes record 
All the goodness of the Lord. 



NO. V. THE negro S VIGIL : 

ON THE EVE OF THE FIRST OF AUGUST, 1834. 
"They that watch for the morning : — they that watch for the morning." 

Psalm cxii. 6. 

Hie to the mountain afar 

All in the cool of the even ; 
Led by yon beautiful' star, 

First of the daughters of heaven : 



1 



SONGS ON THE ABOLITION OF NEGRO SLAVERY. 

Sweet to the slave is the season of rest, 

Something far sweeter he looks for to-night ; 

His heart lies awake in the depth of his breast, 

And listens till God shall say, "Ze/ there be light!" 

Climb we the mountain, and stand 

High in mid-air, to inhale. 
Fresh from our old father-land, 
Balm in the ocean-borne gale : 
Darkness yet covers the face of the deep ; 

Spirit of freedom ! go forth in thy might, 
To break up our bondage like infancy's sleep, 

The moment when God shall say, " Let there be 
light r 

Gaze we, meanwhile, from his peak ; 
Praying in thought while we gaze ; 
Watch for the morning's first streak. 
Prayer then be turn'd into praise ; 
Shout to the valleys, " Behold ye the mom, 

Long, long desired but denied to our sight :" 
Lo, myriads of slaves into men are new-born ; 

The word was omnipotent, " Let there be light T^ 

Hear it and hail it ; — the call, 

Island to island prolong ; 
Liberty ! liberty ! — all 
Join in the jubilee-song : 
Hark ! 'tis the children's hosannas that ring ; 

Hark ! they are free-men whose voices unite ; 
While England, the Indies, and Africa sing, 

"Amen, Hallelujah !" at " Let there be light P^ 



I 



SONNETS, 
IMITATIONS, AND TRANSLATIONS. 



A SEA-PIECE. 

IN THREE SONNETS. 

ScEHE.— Bridlington Quay, 1824. 

I. 

At nightfall, walking on the cliff-crown'd shore, 

Where sea and sky were in each other lost ; 

Dark ships were scudding through the wild uproar, 

Whose wrecks ere morn must strew the dreary coast ; 

I mark'd one well-moor'd vessel tempest-tost. 

Sails reef d, helm lash'd, a dreadful siege she bore. 

Her deck by billow after billow cross'd. 

While every moment she might be no more : 

Yet firmly anchor'd on the nether sand. 

Like a chain'd Lion ramping at his foes. 

Forward and rearward still she plunged and rose, 

Till broke her cable ; — then she fled to land. 

With all the waves in chase ; throes following throes ; 

She 'scaped, — she struck, — she stood upon the strand. 

IL 

The morn was beautiful, the storm gone by ; 
Three days had pass'd ; I saw the peaceful main. 
One molten mirror, one illumined plane. 
Clear as the blue, sublime, o'erarching sky : 
On shore that lonely vessel caught mine eye, 

3l* 365 



Her bow was seaward, all equipt her train, 
Yet to the sun she spread her wings in vain. 
Like a caged Eagle, impotent to fly ; 
There fix'd as if for ever to abide ; 
Far down the beach had roll'd the low neap-tide. 
Whose mingling murmur faintly luU'd the ear : 
" Is this," methought, " is this the doom of pride, 
Check'd in the onset of thy brave career, 
Ingloriously to rot by piecemeal here ?" 

III. 

Spring-tides return'd, and Fortune smiled ; the bay 
Received the rushing ocean to its breast ; 
While waves on Avaves innumerably prest, 
Seem'd, with the prancing of their proud array. 
Sea-horses, flash'd with foam, and snorting spray ; 
Their power and thunder broke that vessel's rest ; 
Slowly, with new expanding life possest. 
To her own element she glid away ; 
Buoyant and bounding like the polar Whale, 
That takes his pastime ; every joyful sail 
Was to the freedom of the wind unfurl' d, 
While right and left the parted surges curl'd : 
— ^Go, gallant Bark, with such a tide and gale, 
I'll pledge thee to a voyage round the world. 



WESTMINSTER ABBEY, 

ON THE TWENTY-EIGHTH OF JUNE, 1838. 
TO THE QUEEN. 

The orb and sceptre in thy hands they placed. 
On thine anointed head a crown of gold ; 

A purple robe thy virgin form embraced ; 
Enthroned thou wert, all-glorious to behold : 
Before thee lay the Book of God unroll'd ; 

Thy tongue pronounced, thy pen the covenant traced, 
Which men and angels witness'd ; — young and old, 



Peers, princes, statesmen, birth and beauty graced 
That scene of tombs and trophies. All is fled ; 

Like life itself, the living pass'd away, 
And none that met remain'd there but the dead ! 
— Thence to thy closet didst thou not retreat, 

In secret to thy heavenly Father pray, 
And cast thyself and kingdom at his feet ? 



SONNET. 

IMITATED FROM THE ITALIAN OF GAETANA PASSERINI. 

If in the field I meet a smiling flower, 

Methinks it whispers, " God created me, 

And I to Him devote my little hour, 

In lonely sweetness and humility." 

If, where the forest's darkest shadows lower, 

A serpent quick and venomous I see. 

It seems to say, — " I, too, extol the power 

Of Him, who caused me, at his will, to be." 

The fountain purhng, and the river strong. 

The rocks, the trees, the mountains raise one song ; 

" Glory to God !" re-echoes in mine ear : 

Faithless were I, in wilful error bUnd, 

Did I not Him in all his creatures find, 

His voice through heaven, and earth, and ocean hear. 



THE OAK. 

IMITATED FROM THE ITALIAN OF METASTASIO. 

The tall Oak, towering to the skies. 
The fury of the wind defies. 
From age to age, in virtue strong. 
Inured to stand, and suffer wrong. 

O'erwhelm'd at length upon the plain. 
It puts forth wings, and sweeps the main 
The self-same foe undaunted braves. 
And fights the wind upon the waves. 



IMITATIONS. 

SONNET. 

IMITATED FKOM THE ITALIAN OF GIAMBATTISTA COTTA. 

I SAW th' eternal God, in robes of light, 

Rise from his throne, — to judgment forth he came ; 

His presence pass'd before me, like the flame 

That fires the forest in the depth of night : 

Whirlwind and storm, amazement and affright, 

Compass'd his path, and shook all Nature's frame, 

When from the heaven of heavens, with loud acclaim, 

To earth he wing'd his instantaneous flight. 

As some triumphal oak, whose boughs have spread 

Their changing foliage through a thousand years, 

Bows to the rushing wind its glorious head. 

The universal arch of yonder spheres 

Sunk with the pressure of its Maker's tread. 

And earth's foundations quaked with mortal fears. 



SONNET. 

THE CRUCIFIXION. 

IMITATED FROM THE ITALIAN OF CUESCIMBENI. 

I ask'd the Heavens, — " What foe to God hath done 

This unexampled deed?" — The Heavens exclaim, 
" 'Twas Man ; — and we in horror snatch'd the sun 

From such a spectacle of guilt and shame." 
I ask'd the Sea ; — the Sea in fury boil'd. 

And answer'd with his voice of storms, " 'Twas Man : 
My waves in panic at his crime recoil'd. 

Disclosed th' abyss, and from the centre ran." 
I ask'd the Earth ; — the Earth replied aghast, 

" 'Twas Man ; — and such strange pangs my bosom rent. 
That still I groan and shudder at the past." 

— To Man, gay, smiling, thoughtless Man, I went, 
And ask'd him next : — He. turn'd a scornful eye, 
Shook his proud head, and deign'd me no reply. 



IMITATIONS. 



SONNET. 

IMITATED FROM THE ITALIAN OF P. SALANDRI. 
TO A BRIDE. 

The more divinely beautiful thou art, 

Lady ! of love's inconstancy beware : 

Watch o'er thy charms, and with an angel's care 

Oh ! guard thy maiden purity of heart : 

At every whisper of temptation start ; 

The hghtest breathings of unhallow'd air 

Love's tender, trembling lustre will impair. 

Till all the light of innocence depart. 

Fresh from the bosom of an Alpine hill, 
When the coy fountain sparkles into day. 
And sunbeams bathe and brighten in its rill ; 
If here a plant, and there a flower, in play. 
Bending to sip, the httle channel fill, 
It ebbs, and languishes, and dies away. 



SONNET. 

IMITATED FROM THE ITALIAN OF SAETANA PASSERINI. 
ON THE SIEGE OF GENOA BY THE FRENCH ARMY IN 16**. 

Liberty speahs. 

» My native Genoa ! if with tearless eye, 
Prone in the dust thy beauteous form I see. 
Think not thy daughter's heart is dead to thee ; 
'Twere treason, O my mother ! here to sigh, 
For here, majestic though in ashes, lie 
Trophies of valour, skill, and constancy ; 
Here at each glance, each footstep, I descry 
The proud memorials of thy love to me. 

" Conquest to noble suffering lost the day, 
And glorious was thy vengeance on the foe, 
— He saw thee perish, yet not feel the blow." 
Thus Liberty, exulting on her way, 
Kiss'd the dear relics, mouldering as they la)^ 
And cried, — " In ruins ? — Fes J — In slavery ? — iV^o .'" 



IMITATIONS. 



SONNET. 

IMITATED FKO.M THE ITALIAN OF PETRARCH. 

Lonely and thoughtful o'er deserted plains, 

I pass with melancholy steps and slow, 

Mine eyes intent to shun, where'er I go. 

The track of man : — from him to hide my pains. 

No refuge save the wilderness remains : 

The curious multitude would quickly know, 

Amidst affected smiles, the cherish'd wo 

That wrings my bosom, and consumes my veins. 

Oh ! that the rocks and streams of solitude, 
The vales and woods alone, my griefs might see ! 
But paths, however secret, wild and rude, 
I find not from tormenting passion free ; 
Where'er I wander, still by Love pursued. 
With Him I hold communion, He with Me. 



SONNET. 

IMITATED FROM THE ITALIAN OF BENEDETTO DALL'uVA. 

ON THE SIEGE OF FAMAGUSTA, IN THE ISLAND OF CYPRUS 

BY THE TURKS, IN 1571. 

Thus saith the Lord : — " In Avhom shall Cyprus trust. 
With all her crimes, her luxury, and pride ? 
In her voluptuous loves will she confide. 
Her harlot-daughters, a^id her queen of lust ? 
My day is come when o'er her neck in dust. 
Vengeance and fury shall triumphant ride, 
Death and captivity the spoil divide. 
And Cyprus perish : — I the Lord am just. 

" Then he that bought, and he that sold in thee, 
Thy princely merchants, shall their loss deplore, 
Brothers in ruin as in fraud before ; 
And thou, Avho mad'st thy rampart of the sea, 
Less by thy foes cast down than crush' d by Me ! 
Thou, Famagusta ! fall, and rise no more." 



IMITATIONS. 

SONNET. 

IMITATED FROM THE ITALIAN OF GABRIELLO FIAMMA. 
ON THE SEPULTURE OF CHRIST. 

Where is the aspect more than heaven serene, 

Which saints and angels vievv'd with pure delight ? 
The meekness and the majesty of mien, 

That won the yielding heart with gentle might ? 
Where is the voice with harmony replete, 

That changed to love the most obdurate will ? 
The eye, whose glance so ravishingly sweet. 

The soul with joy unspeakable could fill ? 
Where is the hand that crush'd our direst foe. 

And Satan's powers in chains of darkness bound ? 
Where is the servant's humble form below, 

In which the eternal Son of God was found ? 
— Lo ! where his pilgrimage of mercy ends : 
What Glory here into the grave descends ! 



SONNET. 

FROM THE ITALIAN OF GIOVAMEATTISTA ZAPPI. 

ON JUDITH RETURNING TO BETHULIA WITH THE HEAD OF 
HOLOFERNES IN HER HAND. 

She held the head all-horrible with gore ; 

Nor of the Avoman in that act was seen 

Aught save th' alluring locks and beauteous mien : 
"Hail, heroine, hail !" all voices cried before. 
At the glad news, the damsels came with speed ; 
Some kiss'd her feet and some her garment's hem, 

None her right-hand, for terrible to them 
Was the remembrance of that fatal deed. 
A hundred prophets sang the matron's fame ; 
" Fly round the world, thine everlasting name ! 

The sun through all his march shall tell thy story." 
Great from that dread achievement though she rose. 
Greater she stood at this triumphant close, 

For she was humble in the height of glory. 



IMITATIONS. 



SONNET. 

FROM THE ITALIAN OF EUSTACIIIO MANFKEDI. 
rOR A NUN, ON TAKING THE VEIL. 

As when a lion, mad Avith hunger, springs 

To seize the ung-uarded shepherd by surprise, 
Fear in a moment lends the victim wings ; 

To some broad elm or ancient oak he flies. 
Climbs for his life, amidst the branches cowers. 

And sees th' infuriate brute, with ramping paws. 
Leap at the trunk, and wearying all his powers. 

Spurn the loose sand, and grind his foaming jaws. 
So she, whom hell's fierce lion mark'd for prey, 

Flies to the tree of life's extended arms. 
The cross of Calvary, — which, night and day. 

Yields shade, and rest, and refuge from alarms ; 
Whence she beholds the baffled fiend again, 
Gnashing his teeth slink back to his old den. 



SONNET. 

From Petrarch, in which tlie Poet lanients the ilealh of his friend Signore Ste- 
fano CoZoJina, occurring soon afterth.it oi Laura. In the original there is a 
symbolical allusion to tlie names of both,— tlie one as a Cohnnit, the other a 
Laurel. 

Fall'n is the lofty Column, and uptorn 

The verdant Laurel, in whose shade my mind 

Found peace I ne'er again may hope to find. 
Though round the heavens o'er earth and ocean borne : 
— O Death I how hast thou me of comfort shorn ! 

My double treasure to the grave consign'd. 
Which made life sweet ! — and wealth with power combined. 
Can ne'er restore to soothe my thought forlorn. 

What can I do, if fate have so decreed. 
But let my sorrowing heart in secret bleed. 
My brow be sad, mine eyes o'erflow with tears ? 

— O Life ! so beautiful to look upon, 

How, in a moment's space, for ever gone 
Is all -we toil to gain through manv years ! 



MEET AGAIN. 



THE SWISS COWHERD'S SONG, 

IX A FOREIGN LAND, 

IMITATED FROM THE FRENCH. 

Oh, when shall I visit the land of my birth, 
The lovehest land on the face of the earth ? 
When shall I those scenes of affection explore. 

Our forests, our fountains. 

Our hamlets, our mountains, 
With the pride of our mountains, the maid I adore ? 
Oh, when shall I dance on the daisy-white mead. 
In the shade of an elm, to the sound of the reed ? 

When shall I return to that lowly retreat. 
Where all my fond objects of tenderness meet, — 
The lambs and the heifers that follow my call, 

My father, my mother. 

My sister, my brother. 
And dear Isabella, the joy of them all ? 
Oh, when shall I visit the land of my birth ? 
— 'Tis the loveliest land on the face of the earth. 



MEET AGAIN!* 

Joyful words, — we meet again ! 
Love's own language, comfort darting 
Through the souls of friends at parting; 
Life in death, — we meet again ! 

While we walk this vale of tears, 
Compass'd round with care and sorrow, 
Gloom to-day, and storm to-morrow, 
" Meet again !" our bosom cheers. 



* The three following pieces were paraphrased from the German. 
VOL. I. 32 



TRANSLATIONS. 



Far in exile, when we roam, 
O'er our lost endearments weeping. 
Lonely, silent vigils keeping, 
"Meet again!" transports us home. 

When this weary world is past, 
Happy they, Avhose spirits soaring, 
Vast eternity exploring, 
"Meet again" in heaven at last. 



VIA CRUCIS, VIA LUCIS. 

Night turns to day : — 

When sullen darkness lowers, 

And heaven and earth are hid from sight, 

Cheer up, cheer up ; 

Ere long the opening flowers. 

With dewy eyes, shall shine in light. 

Storms die in calms : — 

When over land and ocean 

Roll the loud chariots of the wind, 

Cheer up, cheer up ; 

The voice of wild commotion 

Proclaims tranquillity behind. 

Winter wakes spring : — 

When icy blasts are blowing 

O'er frozen lakes, through naked trees. 

Cheer up, cheer up ; 

All beautiful and glowing, 

May floats in fragrance on the breeze. 

War ends in peace : — 

Though dread artillery rattle, 

And ghastly corses load the ground. 

Cheer up, cheer up ; 

Where groan' d the field of battle, 

The song, the dance, the feast go round. 



GERMAN WAR SONG. 



Toil brings repose : — 

With noontide fervours beating, 

When droop thy temples o'er thy breast, 

Cheer up, cheer up ; 

Gray twilight, cool and fleeting. 

Wafts on its wing the hour of rest. 

Death springs to life : — 

Though brief and sad thy story. 

Thy years all spent in care and gloom, 

Look up, look up ; 

Eternity and glory 

Dawn through the portals of the tomb. 



GERMAN WAR SONG.^ 

Heaven speed the righteous sword. 
And freedom be the word ! 
Come, brethren, hand in hand, 
Fight for your father-land ! 

Germania from afar 
Invokes her sons to war ; 
Awake ! put forth your powers. 
And victory must be ours. 

On to the combat, on ! 
Go where your sires have gone : 
Their might unspent remains, 
Their pulse is in our veins. 

On to the battle, on ! 
Rest will be sweet anon ; 
The slave may yield, may fly. 
We conquer, or we die ! 



u 



TRANSLATIONS FROM DANTE. 



UGOLINO AND RUGGIERI. 

The sufferings of Ugolino on earth, and his cannibal revenge in hell, on his be- 
trayer and murderer, Ruggieri, are better known in this country than any other 
part of tlie Divina Commedia, having been often translated, and several times 
made the subject of painting, especially in the rival pictures of Reynolds and 
Fuseli. One version more may be tolerated, and it will probably be long be- 
fore it can be said that yet another is not wanted, to give the Englisli reader 
an adequate idea of the poet's power in the delineation,— not so much of the 
supernatural horrors of his infernal caverns, as of a real earthly scene, (like 
the death by starvation in the dungeon of a father and his four innocent chil- 
dren,) "so simply, so severely great," that of the narrative, in his own Italian, 
it may be said, 

" The force of nature could no further go." 

Ugolino, Count of Gherardesca, having united with the Archbishop Ruggieri 
degli Ubaldini to expel his own nephew, Nino Giudice di Gallura, from the 
sovereignty of Pisa, seized it for himself But the archbishop soon turned 
against him, and being supported by Lanfranchi, Sismondi, and Gualandi, 
three of the principal inhabitants, they raised a tumult in the city, during 
which Ugolino was dragged from his palace, and with his two sons, and their 
two sons, (he calls all four his children in the story,) imprisoned in a tower on 
the Piazza degli Anziani, for several months, at the expiration of which the 
portals were all locked, and the keys thrown into the river Arno : the misera- 
ble captives being thus left to perish with hunger, whence the hold itself ob- 
tained the name of "Famine." With great skill, to produce the most pathetic 
impression, as well as with consummate knowledge of human nature, Dante 
makes Ugolino dwell wholly on the treachery and cruelty exercised towards 
himself, without any allusion to his own atrocious injustice towards his 
nephew, for which he is doomed to the second round of the ninth or lowest 
gulf of Hell, with no mitigation of the pains of eternal hunger, except the ra- 
venous feast, like that of the eagle on the liver of Prometheus, upon the never- 
satisfying and never-wasting brain of the traitor Ruggieri. 

Dante (accompanied by Virgil, his conductor) finds in this department of "Iho 
doleful city" the victims tormented variously, according to tlieir crimes, 

" In thrilling regions of thick-ribbed ice ;" 
and, among others, the two personages aforenamed. 

Scarce had we parted thence, when I beheld 
Two in one well of ice, so grouped together 
The head of one to the other seem'd the cowl, 
While, like a hungiy man devouring bread. 
The uppermost had fiisten'd with his teeth 
Upon the lower, where slaiU and neck are join'd ; 

376 



UGOLIXO AND RUGGIERI. 



Nor more voraciously did Tydeus tear 
The front of Menalippus, in his rage,* 
Than on that head and brain th' assailant prey'd. 

" O thou !" I cried, who show'st by such brute token 
Hatred to him whom thou devourest, say. 
Why dost thou so ? — I ask on this condition, 
That knowing who thou art, and what his crime, 
If thou have cause of wrong against thy victim, 
I yet may right thee in the upper world, 
Should that with which I speak be not dried up." 

DelV Inferno, canto xxxii. 
The sinner paused amidst his dire repast, 
And wiped his mouth upon the hairy scalp 
Of him whose head he raven'd on behind. 
Then answer'd : — 

" Thou wouldst have me to renew 
Horrible pangs, of which the very thought 
So wrings my heart, I scarce find power for utterance : 
Yet if my words prove seed, of which the traitor. 
Whom thus I gnaw, may reap th' accursed fruit, 
Thou shah behold me weep and speak at once. 

" I know not who thou art, nor by what means 
Thou hast come hither, but a Florentine, 
By speech, I deem thee. — Know me, then. 
Count Ugolino, — this, th' Archbishop Ruggier, 
And why I'm such a neighbour thou shalt hear. 
I need not say how, by his foul devices, 
Reposing on his faith, I was ensnared. 
And murder'd : — but, what cannot have been told thee, 
How cruel was that murder, thou shalt know ; 
Then judge if he have injured me or not. 

"When the small casement of that dungeon cage. 
Which hath from me the name of ' Famine,' — where 
Others may yet be left like me to perish, — 
Through its dim aperture, had more than once 
Shown the new moon, an evil sleep fell on me, 
Which from the future rent the veil. 

* Status, Tlieh^l- vii. 
32* 




— Methought 
This wretch, as lord and master of the field, 
Hunted a he-wolf and his whelps along 
The mountain which from Pisa shadows Lucca, 
With meager, staunch, and noble-blooded hounds, 
Gualandi, and Sismondi, and Lanfranchi 
Swept on before him. — After a short chase, 
Parent and young fell, fainting from fatigue. 
And Avith keen fangs I saw them torn to pieces. 

" When I awoke at day -break, — in their sleep, 
I heard my children moan, and ask for bread 
(For they Avere with me) ; — cruel is thine heart 
If it grieves not for what mine then foreboded, 
And if thou weep'st not now, what wilt thou weep for ? 
— Ere long they woke ; the hour drew nigh Avhen food 
Was wont to be brought to us ; but in each 
Secret misgivings from his dream arose ; 
And of the horrible tower, I heard the portal 
Lock'd underneath our cell. Thereat I look'd 
Full on my children, but spake not a word. 
Nor wept, so petrified I feU within. 
They wept, and little Anselm said to me, 
' You look so, father ! Ah ! what mean those looks V 
Still I wept not, nor answer'd all that day. 
Nor the next night. 

At sun-rise on the morrow. 
When a faint raygleam'd through our doleful prison, 
And in four haggard faces show'd me mine, 
I worried both my hands with agony : 
They, thinking that I did so in the rage 
Of hunger, all together rose and cried, 
♦ Father ! 'twill hurt us less if you will feed 
On us ; you clothed these hmbs with suffering flesh, 
Now strip them !' 

Then I quieted myself. 
Not to make them more wretched. — All that day, 
And all the next, Ave sat, and held our peace ; 
Ah ! earth, hard earth ! Avhy didst thou not then open ? 



MAESTRO ADAMO. 



" When we had linger'd on till the fourth day, 
My Gaddo threw himself down at my feet, 
Crying, ' My father ! why do you not help me V 
Then died. — As plainly as thou seest me now, 
I saw the other three fall, one by one. 
Between the fifth day and the sixth. Then blind 
I groped about to feel and clasp their bodies ; 
Three days I call'd them by their names, though dead, 
Then famine did for me what grief could not." 

Deir Inferno, canto xxxiii. 



MAESTRO ADAMO. 

The hideously comic interview and adventure with Maestro Adamo (Master 
Adam,) the coiner,— in another of the lower rounds of the infernal gulf, where 
traitors of the baser sort are tormented with unappeasable thirst, in various 
diseases that excite it, — is thoroughly Danlesque, but in the poet's coarser vein. 
It may form a singular companioii-piere to the fenrfuUy sublime, but simply 
tol.l and tenderly affectinjr, narrative of Count Ugolino. 

I SAW one shapen like a lute, had he 
Been shorten'd where the man becomes a fork ;* 
Enormous dropsy (which had swoln his limbs 
With stagnant humours, till his ghastly cheek 
But ill agreed Avith his unwieldy paunch) 
Made him, for thirst, gasp like a hectic,^-one 
Lip lolling on his chin, upcurl'd the other. 

"Oh! you," he cried, "that without pain (though why 
I know not) pass through this unhappy world, 
Hear, and mark well the sorrows of Adamo ; 
Living, I had Avhatever heart could wish, 
And now, alas ! I lack a drop of water. 
The murmuring rivulets down the verdant hills 
Of Cassentino, flowing into Arno, 
Which keep their little channels moist and cool. 
Are ever in mine eye ; — and not in vain. 
For their sweet images inflame my thirst 

* The strange phrase employed in the original quaintly signifies, 
^"if he had been shortened from the waist." 



More than the malady that shrinks my visage. 

The rigid justice, which torments me here, 

Even from the place where I committed sin, 

Draws means to mock and multiply my groans ; 

Romena stands before me, where I forged 

The lawful coin and Baptist's seal, for which 

I left my wretched body in the flames,'' 

— Yet could I spy the woful ghost of Guido, 

Of Alessandro, or their brother, here, 

I would not quit the sight for Branda's fountain ! 

Somewhere among these pits dwells one, — if truth 

Be told by those mad souls that roam at large, — 

But what is that to me whose limbs are bound ? 

Oh ! were I light enough to move an inch 

A century, I had set out ere now 

In search of him among the hideous throng, 

Through all the eleven long miles of »his sad circle. 

Which hath not less than half a mile in breadth ! 

They brought me to this family of fiends, 

They tempted me to falsify the florin, 

And mix it with three carats of alloy." 

Then I to him : — " And who are these two wretches, 
That smoke like hands in winter plunged through snow 
Lying close fetter'd on the right of thee ?" 

" I found them here, and they have never stirr'd 
Since I was dropt into this ditch," he answer'd : 
" One's the false woman who accused young Joseph, 
And t'other Sinon, the false Greek at Troy, 
Who, in the excruciate pangs of putrid fever. 
Send up such steam." 

That moment one of them, 
Wroth to be named so ignominiously, 
Struck with the fist on his distended hide, 
That thunder'd like a drum ; — but Master Adam 
Repaid the blow upon the assailant's face, 
Not less afllictive, with his arm ; exclaiming, 
" Though reft of locomotion, being so large, 
I have a hand at liberty for that.'''' 



MAESTRO ADAMO. 



To whom the other : — " Thou wert not so prompt. 
When thou wast going to the stake ; and yet 
More prompt than now when thou didst stamp the coin. 

" Thou speak'st the truth," the dropsical repHed, 
"But didst not so at Troy, when truth was ask'd thee." 

"False words I utter'd then, as thou false money ; 
If for one crime I suffer, thou art damn'd 
For more than any demon here," quoth Sinon. 

" Remember ! perjured one, the hollow horse, 
With its full belly," Adam cried, " and stand 
Guilty through all the world." 

" Stand guilty thou !" 
The Greek retorted; "witness that huge round, 
That quagmire, which engulfs thee in thyself." 

The coiner then : — " Thy mouth for evil-speaking 
Is quite as open as it wont to be ; 
If I have drought while humours swell me up, 
Thou hast a burning heart and aching head, 
And wouldst not need much coaxing to the task 
To lap the mirror of Narcissus dry." 

I stood all fix'd to hear them. — "Little more 
Would make me quarrel with thee ; so be warn'd," 
Cried Virgil : — Avhen I heard him speak in warmth, 
I turn'd about, and colour' d with such shame, 
The very thought brings back the blush upon me. 
Like one who dreams of harm befalling him. 
And dreaming wishes it may be a dreain, 
Desiring that which is as though it were not, 
So I, unable to excuse myself, 
(For I stood mute,) excused myself the more, 
Unwittingly. — " Less shame than thine might make 
Atonement for a greater fault than thine," 
My Master said, " so cast away thy sadness ; 
And know that I am ever at thy side ; 
If fortune brings thee where such knaves fall out, 
— To love their broils betrays a base-born mind." 

DelV Inferno, canto xxx. 




DANTE AND BEATRICE. 



There is no circumstance in tlie whole compass of the Divina Commedia more 
exquisitely imagined than the unfdt swiftness with which Dante and Beatrice, 
by the mere act of volition on tlieir part, are transported from planet to planet 
in the Paradiso ; nor is the evidence of their arrival at each new stage, in the 
increased loveliness of the lady to the eyes of the poet, less delicately con- 
ceived. 

I FELT not our ascension to that star, 

But soon of this my lady gave me warning, 

For she had grown more beautiful. 

Del Paradiso, canto viii. 



Their first flight from the Hill of Purgatory was to the moon. Their entrance 
within the sphere of "that eternal pearl" is thus described. 

The native-born and everlasting thirst 

For that pure realm, resembling God himself, 

Carried us thither, swift as move the heavens. 

My lady look'd aloof, and I on her ; 
Then, in as brief a space as, on the string. 
An arrow rests, escapes, and flits away,^ 
I found myself transported, and arrived, 
Where a strange thing surprised me ; but my guide, 
From whom naught in my heart could be conceal'd, 
Turn'd, with a sweet and gracious countenance. 
Exclaiming, " Now, thank God ! that we have reach'd 
The nearest star."* — Methought a lucid, dense. 
And brilliant cloud, like diamond, which the sun 
Transpierces, compass'd us on every side : 
Within the orb of that eternal pearl. 
We enter'd, — as a ray of light pervades 
The crystal wave, united yet unbroken, 

Del Paradiso, canto ii. 



The sign which spiritual intelligences in heaven give of their desire to converse 
with the travellers that visit their respective abodes, by shining out from 
among their companions with intenscr lustre, is of the same happy character 
of thought with the idea of Beatrice's beauty brightening as she mounts from 
sphere to sphere. 

She ceased, and seem'd to enter a new round 
Within the wheel where she revolved before ;* 
That other ardour, known to me already, 
Now flash'd out marvellously upon my sight, 
Like a fine ruby smitten by the sun; 
For joy in heaven brings splendour, as it brings 
Laughter on earth ; — but, in the abyss of hell, 
Horror grows blacker as the mind more sad. 

Del Paradiso, canto ix. 



THE RIVER OF LIFE. 

The greater part of the Paradiso,— yvhWe it exemplifies, almost beyond example) 
the power of human language to vary a few ideas and images in themselves so 
simple, pure, and hallowed, that they hardly can be altered from their estab- 
lished associations without being degraded,— shows also the utter impotence 
of any other terms than those which Scripture has employed "as in a glass 
darkly," — and who can there add light 1— to body forth what eye hath not seen, 
ear heard, neither hath entered into the heart of man to conceive. One elabo- 
rate specimen (however defective the translation may be) will elucidate this 
failure even in the noble original, which, like its ineffable theme, in this part 
is "dark with excessive bright." The poet here copies more directly than he 
is wont from the sacred Oracles ; or, as in the sublime simile of the rock, illus- 
trates his subject with not unworthy natural objects; at the same time, with 
characteristic ingenuousness, he explains his own feelings on beholding "things 
which it is not lawful for a man to utter." 

As sudden lightning dissipates the sight, 

And leaves the eye unable to discern 

The plainest objects, — living light so flash'd 

Around me, and involved me in a veil 

Of such effulgence, that I ceased to see. 

" Thus Love, which soothes this heaven, all kindly fits 

The torch to take his flame !"t — These iew, brief words 



* A mystic dance, most curiously described in the original, in which the 
celestials are engaged. 
t Beatrice addresses this remark to Dante. 



TRANSLATIONS. 



Had scarcely reach'd mine ear, when I perceived 
Power from on high diffuse such virtue through me, 
And so rekindle vision, that no flame, 
However pure, could 'scape mine eyes. 

I saw 
Light, like a river clear as crystal, flowing 
Between two hanks with wondrous spring adorn'd ; 
Wliile from the current issued vivid sparks, 
That fell among the flowers on either hand, 
Ghtter'd hkc rubies set in gold, and then. 
As if intoxicate with sweetest odours, 
Replungcd themselves into the mystic flood. 
Whence, as one disappear'd, another rose. 

"The intense desire that warms and stirs thy thoughts 
To understand what thou beholdest, yields 
More joy to me, the more it urges thee ; 
But ere such noble thirst can be assuaged. 
Behooves thee first to drink of this clear fount." 
The sun that lights mine eyes* thus spake, and added : 
— " Yon stream, those jewels flitting to and fro. 
And all the joyance of these laughing flowers. 
Are shadowy emblems of realities. 
Not dark themselves, but the defect is thine. 
Who hast not yet obtain'd due strength of vision." 

Ah ! then, no infant, startled out of sleep, 
Long past his time, springs to the mother's milk 
More eagerly than o'er that stream I bow'd. 
To make more perfect lustres of mine eyes, 
Which, when the fringes of their hds had touch' d it 
Seem'd, from a line, collapsed into a round. 
— As maskers, when they cast their visors off'. 
Appear new persons, stript of such disguise. 
The sparks and flowers assumed sublimer fonTis,t 
And both the courts of heaven were open'd round me. 



* Deatrice. 

t They were transfiirurod from symbols into tlieir spiritual identities; and, as 
intimated below, the sparks were the souls of all the saints wlio had been re- 
moved in past ages to the bliss of heaven. 



THE RIVER OF LIFE. 



O splendour of the Deity ! by which 
The lofty triumph of thy real reign 
I saw, — give power to paint it as I saw. 

There is a hght, which renders visible 
The Maker to the creature who desires 
Felicity in seeing Him alone : 
— Though but a ray of uncreated glory, 
Sent from the fountain-head of life and power, 
It forms a circle, whose circumference 
Would be too wide a girdle for the sun : 
And, as a chfFin water, from its foot. 
Looks down upon its height in that broad mirror, 
And seems therein contemplating its beauty, 
What verdure clothes, what flowers its flanks adorn, 
So, standing round about that sea of glass. 
As many souls as earth hath sent to heaven. 
Upon ten thousand thrones and more, beheld 
Their happy semblances reflected there. 

If, round its lowest stem such pomp appear, 
What must the full-expanded foliage show 
Of that celestial rose ?* and yet my sight, 
Through its whole amplitude and elevation, 
Gazed unbewilder'd ; yea, at once took in 
The measure and the amount of all that joy. 

Bel Paradiso, canto xxx. 



* This refers to a dry conceit, which runs through much of the Paradiso, ar- 
ranging the happy spirits throughout the various heavens, in different forms, 
such as an eagle, a cross, &c., and here a rose. 



33 




THE PORTAL OF HELL 



Awfully contrasted with the foregoing dazzling spectacle, but far more real in 
its picturesque and imaginalile grandeur, is the famous description of the en- 
trance upon the infernal regions. 

" Through me, ye go into the doleful city, 

Through me, ye go into eternal pain, 

Through me, ye go among the lost for ever: 

'Twas justice moved my Founder ; Power divine, 

Infinite Wisdom and primeval Love, 

Ordain'd and fix'd me here. Before me naught 

That is existed, save eternal things. 

And I unto eternity endure ; 

— Abandon every hope, all ye that enter !" 

These words in sombre colours I beheld ■ 
Inscribed upon the summit of a portal : 
" 'Tis a hard sentence. Master !" I exclaim'd ; 
When he, Hke one of ready speech, repHed : 
" Leave all mistrust, all base misgiving here. 
We now have reach'd the place of which I told thee. 
Where thou shalt see the miserable throngs 
Who mourn the loss of intellectual good." 

Then straightway, in his hand enclasping mine, 
With brightening countenance that cheer'd my heart, 
He led me down among the things of darkness : — 
There sighs, and groans, and lamentable wailings. 
So rang throughout that region without star. 
That on the threshold I began to weep : 
Horrible tongues, discordant languages, 
Words full of dolour, accents of sharp anger. 
Shrill and hoarse voices, sounds of smitten hands. 
Rose in wild tumult, eddying through the gloom, 
Like sands before the whirlwind of the desert. 

Deir Inferno, canto iii. 




ANTEUS. 

Dante and Virgil, in the lowest gulf but one, find the ancient giants bound on 
rocks or wedged in caverns. From one of these they solicit help, namely, — 
a lift downward into the last abyss, where Lucifer (three-faced, and eternally 
worrying at each of his mouths, Judas Iscariot, Brutus, and Cassius) is em- 
bedded in adamantine ice. The negotiation is conducted with grea.1 finesse on 
the part of Virgil, who assails the monster on his wealc side, the '■'■laudum 
immcnsa cupidu," unextinguished even there, where "hope never comes ;" 
the poet himself, at the same time, betraying, though from the lips of his guide, 
that pride of conscious power to praise or give renown, which often and unex- 
pectedly throws a passing glory over his human nature, even when the in- 
firmity of the latter is most frankly confessed. 

— We jouniey'd on, and reach'd Anteus, 
Who stood above the pit's mouth five good ells, 
Besides his head. — " O thou ! who in the field 
Of fortune, that made Scipio glory's heir, 
When Hannibal with all his veterans fled. 
Didst catch a hundred lions for thy prey ; 
' And 'tis believed, that, in their war with heaven, 
Hadst thou been with thy brethren they had triumph'd, 
— Land us beloiv — (nay, scowl not thus askance) — 
Wliere cold congeals Cocytus. Force us not 
Aid to implore of Tithyus or of Typhon : 
This man can give thee what ye covet here ; 
Bow then, nor grin upon us like a griffin ;* 
He yet can make thee famous through the world, 
For he still lives, and counts on length of days, 
If grace remove him not before his time." 

So spake my Master, and in haste the giant 
Stretch'd forth the hand, whose gripe cramp'd Hercules, 
To take us up : — when Virgil felt his grasp, 
" Hither," he cried, " come hither, let me hold thee ;" 
He caught me, and we both became one burden. 
Then, as the tower of Carisenda seems 

* "Torcer lo grifo,"' an Italian phrase for "to make an ugly face." 




Itself in motion, to the eye beneath, 
When a cloud sails above its leaning top ; 
So seem'd Anteus, when I watch'd him bend, 
And wish'd myself elsewhere ; but easily, 
Down in the gulf that gorges Lucifer 
And Judas, he deposited us twain : 
Nor stooping stay'd he, but anon, erect. 
Rose like a ship's mast from the rocking surge. 

DelV Inferno, canto xxsS. 



CAIN. 

If, in the scene with Anteus, the emphasis of silence, and the perspicuity of 
graphic delineation, are happily exemplified, in the following brief passage the 
force of mere sounds (where no image or personification is presented to the 
eye) is made to produce a surprising effect. On one of the sloping mazes of 
the spiral Hill of Purgatory, the travellers having parted with some agreeable 
company, which had long engaged them, it is said : — 

We knew those friendly spirits heard us going, 
Their silence therefore show'd our path was right : 
Now left alone, proceeding on our journey. 
Like hghtning when it rends the region, rush'd 
A voice beside us, lamentably crying, 
"Ah ! every one that findeth me shall slay me !"* 
And then it fled, like thunder that explodes. 
All in a moment, from the riven cloud : 
— Scarce from that sound our ears had truce, when lo ! 
Brake forth another, with astounding peal, 
" I am Aglauros who was turn'd to stone."t 
Closer behind the poet's back I cower'd, 
— Then was the air in every quarter still. 

Del Purgatorio, canto xiv. 

♦ Genesis iv. 14. \ Ovid. Metam. lib. ii. 




FARINATA. 

In the tenth canto of the "Inferno," where heretics are described as being 
tormented in tombs of fire, the lids of which are suspended over them till the 
day of judgment, Uante finds Farinata D'Uberti, an illustrious commander of 
the Ohibellincs, (the adherents of the emperor,) who, at the battle of Monte 
Aperto, in 1260, had so utterly defeated the Ouelfs (the Pope's party) of Flo- 
rence, that the city lay at the mercy of its enemies, by whom counsel was 
taken to rase it to the ground ; but Farinata, because his bowels yearned 
towards the place of his nativity, stood up alone to oppose the barbarous 
design; and partly by raonace— having drawn his sword in the midst of the 
assembly — and partly by persuasion, preserved it from destruction. Notwith- 
standing this patriotic interference, when the Guelfs afterwards regained the 
ascendency, he and his kindred were most inveterately proscribed there, and 
doomed to perpetual exile. 
The interview between Dante and this magnanimous foe, in those 
" Regions of sorrow, doleful shades, where peace 

And rest can never dwell ; hope never comes, 

That comes to all ; but torture without end 

Still urges, and i fiery deluge, fed 

With ever-burning sulphur unconsumed," — 

{Paradise Lost, book i.) 

is painted with transcendent power of colouring, and stern, undecorated 
energy of style. To prepare the reader for well understanding the episode, 
which abruptly breaks through the order of this high dramatic scene, it is 
necessary to state that Cavalcante Cavalcanti, whose head appears out of an 
adjacent sepulchre, was the father of Guide Cavalcanti, a poet, the particular 
friend of Dante, and chief of the Bianchi party, who were banished during his 
priorship. 

" O Tuscan ! Thou, who, through this realm, of fire, 
Alive dost walk, thus courteously conversing, 
Pause, if it please thee here. Thy dialect 
Proclaims thy lineage from that noble land, 
Which I perhaps too much have wrong'd." 

Such sounds 
Suddenly issued forth from one of those 
Sepulchral caverns. — Tremblingly I crept 
A little nearer to my guide ; but he 
Cried, " Turn again ! what wouldst thou do ? Behold 
'Tis Farinata, that hath raised himself: 
There mayst thou see him, upward from the loins." 
— Already had I fix'd mine eyes on his, 



DO TRANSLATIONS. 

Who stood, with hust and visage so erect, 
As though he look'd on hell itself with scorn. 
My Master then, with prompt and resolute hands. 
Thrust me among the charnel-vaults towards him. 
Saying: — "Thy words be plain !" When I had reach'd 
His tombstone-foot, he look'd at me awhile 
As in disdain ; then loftily demanded, — 
" Who were thine ancestors ?" 

— Eager to tell. 
Naught I conceal'd, but utter'd all the truth. 
Arching his brow a little, he return'd, 
" Bitter antagonists of mine, of me, 
And of my party, were thy sires ; but twice 
I scatter'd them." 

"If scatter'd twice," said I, 
" Once and again they came from all sides back, 
— A lesson, which thy friends have not well learn'd." 

Just then, a second figure, at his side. 
Emerged to view ; unveil'd above the chin, 
And kneeling, as methought. — It look'd around 
So wistfully, as though it hoped to find 
Some other with me ; but, that hope dispell'd, 
Weeping it spake : — " If through this dungeon-gloom 
Grandeur of genius guide thy venturous way, 
My son ! — Where is he ? — and why not with thee?" 

Then I to him : — " Not of myself I came ; 
He Avho awaits me yonder brought me hither, 
— One whom perhaps thy Guido held in scorn."'' 
His speech and form of penance had already 
Taught me his name ; my words were therefore pointed. 
Upstarting he exclaim'd, — " How? — saidst thou held? 
Lives he not then ? and doth not heaven's sweet hght 
Fall on his eyes ?" — when I was slow to answer, 
Backward he sunk and reappear'd no more. 

Meanwhile that other most majestic form, 
Near which I stood, neither changed countenance. 
Nor turn'd his neck, nor lean'd to either side : 
"And if," quoth he, our first debate resuming. 



FARINATA. 



" They have not well that lesson learn'd, the thought 
Torments me more than this infernal bed : 
And yet, not fifty times her changing face, 
Who here reigns sovereign, shall be re-illumined, 
Ere thou shalt know how hard that lesson is.* 
— But tell me — so mayst thou return in peace 
To the dear world above ! — why are thy people 
In all their acts so mad against my race ?" 

" The slaughter and discomfiture," said I, 
" That turn'd the river red at Mont' Aperto, 
Have caused such dire proscription in our temples." 
He shook his head, deep-sighing, and rejoin'd : 
" I was not there alone, nor without cause 
Engaged with others ; but I was alone. 
And stood in her defence with open broAV, 
When all our council, with one voice, decreed, 
That Florence should be rased from her foundation." 

" So may thy kindred find repose, as thou 
Shalt loose a knot which hath entangled me !" 
Thus I adjured him : — " Ye foresee what time 
(If rightly I have learn'd) will bring to pass. 
But to the present, otherwise, are blind." 

" We see, like him that hath t^n evil eye. 
Far distant things," said he, " so highest God 
Enhghtens us, but yet when they approach. 
Or when they are, our intellect falls short ; 
Nor can we know, save by report from others. 
Aught of the state of man below the sun ; 
Hence mayst thou comprehend, how all our knowledge 
Shall cease for ever from that point, which shuts 
The portal of the future." 

At that moment, 
Compunction smote me for my recent fault, 
And I cried out : — " O tell that fallen one, 
His son is yet among the living : — say. 



* He foretells Dante's own expulsion from his country, within fifty lunar 
months. 



TRANSLATIONS. 



That if I falter'd to reply at first, 
With that assurance, 'twas because my thoughts 
Were harass'd by the doubt which thou hast solved." 
DelV Inferno, canto x. 

Tlie reader of these lines (however inferior the translation may be) cannot have 
failed to perceive by what natural action and speech, the paternal anxiety of Ca- 
valcanti respecting his son is indicated. On his bed of torture he hears a voice 
which he knows to be that of his son's friend : he starts up, loolts eagerly about, 
as expecting to see his son; but observing the friend only, he at once interrupts 
the dialogue between Dante and Farinata, and in broken exclamations inquires 
concerning hini. The poet happening to employ the past tense of a verb in refer- 
ence to what his "Guido" might have done, the miserable parent instantly lays 
hold of that minute circumstance, as an intimation of his death, and asks hurried 
questions of which he dreads the answers, precisely in the manner of Macduff, 
when he learns from the messenger that his wife and children had been murder- 
ed by Macbeth. Dante hesitating to reply, Cavalcanti takes the worst for grant- 
ed, falls back in despair, and appears not again. Thus with him 
" Even from the tomb the voice of nature cries." 
The poet, however, at the close of the scene, unexpectedly recurs to his own 
fault with the tenderness of compunction and delicacy due to an unfortunate be- 
ing, whom he had unintentionally agonized by his silence, and sends a message 
to the old man that his son yet lives. Contrasted with this trembling sensibility 
of a father's affection, stronger than death, and outfeeling the pains of hell, is 
the proud, calm, patient dignity of Farinata, who, though wounded to the quick 
by the sarcastic retort of Dante, at the instant when the discourse was inter- 
rupted, stands unmoved in mind, in look, in posture, till the episode is ended; 
and then, without the slightest allusion to it, he takes up the suspended argument 
at the last words of his opponent, as though his thoughts had been all the while 
ruminating on the disgrace of his friends, the afflictions of his family, and the in- 
extinguishable enmity of his countrymen against himself. His noble rejoinder, 
on Dante's reference to the carnage at Monte Aperto, as the cause of his people's 
implacability, is above all praise. Indeed, it would be difficult to point out in an- 
cient or modern tragedy, a passage of more sublimity or pathos, in which so few 
words express so much, yet leave more to be imagined by anyone who has "a 
human heart," as the whole of this scene in the original Italian exhibits. 



NOTES. 



THE REV. RUFUS W. GRISWOLD. 



NOTES TO VOL. I 



THE WANDERER OF SWITZERLAXD. 

Page 53. 

1 More properly the Avalanches; immense accumulations of ice 
and snow, balanced on the verge of the mountains in such subtle sus- 
pense, that, in the opinion of the natives, the tread of the traveller may 
bring them down in destruction upon him. The Glaciers are more 
permanent masses of ice, and formed rather in the valleys than on the 
summits of the Alps. 

Page 56. 

2 Brun jfEN, at the foot of the mountains, on the borders of the lake 
of Ubi, where the first Swiss Patriots, Walter Furst of Uri, Wer- 
ner Stauffacher of SciiwiTZ, and Arnold of Melchtal in Ux- 
DERWALDEN, conspired against the tyranny of Austria in 1307, again, 
in 1798, became the seat of the Diet of these three forest cantons. 

Page 56. 

3 On the plains of Mohgarthen, where the Swiss gained their first 
decisive victory over the force of Austria, and thereby secured the inde- 
pendence of their country ; Aloys Reding, at the head of the troops 
of the little cantons, Uri, Schwitz, and Underwalden, repeatedly 
repulsed the invading army of France. 

Page 56. 
* By the resistance of these small cantons the French General 
ScHAWENBOURo was Compelled to respect their independence, and 
gave them a solemn pledge to that purport ; but no sooner had they dis- 
armed, on the faith of this engagement, than the enemy came suddenly 
upon them with an immense force ; and with threats of extermination 
compelled them to take the civic oath to the new constitution, imposed 
upon all Switzerland. 

395 



Page 56. 
* The inhabitants of the Lower Valley of Undkhwalden alone re- 
sisted the French message, which required submission to the new con- 
Gtitution, and the immediate surrender, alive or dead, of nine of their 
leaders. When the demand, accompanied by a menace of destruction, 
was read in the Assembly of the District, all the men of the Valley, fif- 
teen hundred in number, took up arms, and devoted themselves to perish 
in the ruins of their country. 

Page 57. 

6 At the battle of Sempach, the Austrians presented so impenetrable 
a front with their projected spears, that the Swiss were repeatedly com- 
pelled to retire from the attack, till a native of Undzrwalben, named 
AnxoLn de Winkelried, commending his family to his couiitrjmcn, 
sprang upon the enemy, and, burying as many of their spears as he 
could grasp in his body, made a breach in tlieir line ; the Swiss rushed 
in, and routed the Austrians with a terrible slaughter. 

Page 58. 

7 Many of the UNDEHArAEDERs, on the approach of the French army> 
removed their families and cattle among the Higher Alps ; and them- 
selves returned to join their brethren, who had encamped in their native 
Valley, on the borders of the Lake, and awaited the attack of the 
enemy. 

Page 59. 

8 The French made their first attack on the Valley of Underwal- 
BEX from the Lake : but, after a desperate conflict, they were victori- 
ously repelled, and two of their vessels, containing five hundred men, 
perished in the engagement. 

Page 60. 

9 In the last and decisive battle, the UNDERWALrEHs were over, 
powered by two French armies, which rushed upon them from the 
opposite mountains, and surrounded their camp, while an assault, at 
the same time, was made upon them fi-om the Lake. 

Page 62. 

10 In this miserable conflict, many of the women and children of 
the Underwalders fought in the ranks by their husbands, and fa- 
thers, and friends, and fell gloriously for their country. 



NOTES TO VOL. I. 397 



Page 63. 
1' Two hundred self-devoted heroes from the canton of Switz ar- 
rived, at the close of the battle, to the aid of their brethren of Underwal- 
DEx, — and perished to a man, after having slain thrice their number. 

Page 63. 
•2 The Latanges are tremendous torrents of melting snow, that 
tumble from the tops of the Alps, and deluge all the country before 
them. 

Page 65. 
'3 Mont Blanc ; which is so much higher than the surrounding 
Alps, that it catches and retains the beams of the sun twenty minutes 
earlier and later than they, and, crowned with eternal ice, may be seen 
from an immense distance, purpling with his eastern light, or crimsoned 
with his setting glory, while mist and obscurity rest on the mountains 
below. 

Page 72. 
'^ The town of Staxtz, and the surrounding villages, were burnt by 
the French on the night after the battle of Uxdehwaluen, and the 
beautiful valley was converted into a wilderness. 

Page 75. 
•5 There is a tradition among the Swiss, that they are descended 
from the ancient Scandinavians; -among whom, in a remote age, there 
arose so grievous a famine, that it was determined in the Assembly of 
the Nation, that every tenth man and his family should quit their 
country, and seek a new possession. Six thousand, chosen by lot, thus 
emigrated at once from the North. They prayed to God to conduct 
them to a land lilce their own, where they might dwell in freedom and 
quiet, finding food for their families, and pasture for their cattle. God, 
says the tradition, led them to a valley among the Alps, where they 
cleared away the forests, built the town of Switz, and afterwards 
peopled and cultivated the cantons of Uni and UxDEnwALDEN. 



THE WEST INDIES. 

Page 81. 
1 Mungo Parke, in his travels, ascertained that « the great river of 
the Negroes" flows eastward. It is probable, therefore, that this river 
is either lost among the sands, or empties itself into some inland sea, 
in the undiscovered regions of Africa. See also page 88, line 32. 

roL. 1. 34 



Page 83. 

2 When the author of The West Indies conceived the plan of this 
introduction of Columbus, he was not aware that he was indebted to 
any preceding poet for a hint on the subject ; but, some time afterwards, 
on a second perusal of Soutiiey's Madoc, it struck him that the idea 
of Columbus walking on the shore at sunset, which he had hitherto 
imagined his own, might be only a reflection of the impression made 
upon his mind long before, by the first reading of the following splendid 
passage. He therefore gladly makes this acknowledgment, though at 
his own expense, in justice to the author of the noblest narrative poem 
in the English language, after the Faerik Queene and Paradise Lost. 

" When evening came toward the echoing shore 
I and Cadwallon walk'd together forth : 
Bright with dilated glory shone the west ; 
But brighter lay the ocean flood below. 
The burnish'd silver sea, that heaved and flash'd 
Its restless rays intolerably bright. 
' Prince !' quoth Cadwallon, ' thou hast rode the waves 
In triumph when the Invader felt thine arm. 
Oh ! what a nobler conquest might be won 
There, — upon that wide field !' — ' What meanest thoul' 
I cried : — ' That yonder waters are not spread 
A boundless waste, a bourne impassable ; 
That thou shouldst rule the'*elements, — that there 
Might manly courage, manly wisdom, find 
Some happy isle, some undiscovcr'd shore. 
Some resting-place for peace. Oh ! that my soul 
Could seize the wings of morning ! soon would I 
-Behold that other world, where yonder sun 
Now speeds to down in glory.' " 
Page 87. 

3 The Cane is said to have been first transplanted from Madeira to 
the Brazils, by the Portuguese, and afterwards introduced by the 
Spaniards into the Charibbee Islands. 

Page 95. 
* The description of African life and manners that follows, and the 
song of the Negro's daughters, are copied without exaggeration from 
the authentic accounts of Mungo Park. 

Page 103. 
5 The context preceding and following this line alludes to the old 
Bohemian and Moravian Brethren, who flourished long before the 




Reformation, but afterwards were almost lost among the Protestants, 
till the beginning of the eighteenth century, when their ancient epis- 
copal church was revived in Lusatia, by some refugees from Moravia. — 
See Crantz's Ancient and Modern History of the Brethren. Histories 
of the missions of the Brethren in Greenland, North America, and the 
West Indies, have been published in Germany : those of the two former 
have been translated into English. — See Crantz's History of Greenland, 
and Loskiel's History of the Brethren among the Indians in North Jlme- 
rica. It is only justice here to observe, that Christians of other de- 
nominations have exerted themselves with great success in the con- 
version of the Negi'oes. No invidious preference is intended to be 
given to the Moravians ; but, knowing them best, the author particu- 
larized this society. 

Page 10.5. 

6 The author of this poem confesses himself under many obligations 
to Mr. Wilberforce's eloquent letter on the Abolition of the Slave Trade, 
addressed to the Freeholders of Yorkshire, and published in 1807, pre- 
vious to the decision of the question. Las Casas has been accused of 
being a promoter, if not the original projector, of the Negro Slave Trade 
to the West Indies. The Abbe Gregoire some years ago published a 
defence of this great and good man against the degrading imputation. 
The following, among other arguments which he advances, are well 
worthy of consideration. 

The slave trade between Africa and the West Indies commenced, 
according to Herrera himself, the first and indeed the only accuser of 
Las Casas, nineteen years before the epoch of his pretended project. 

Herrera (from whom other authors have negligently taken the fact 
for granted, on his bare word) does not quote a single authority in sup- 
port of his assertion that Las Casas recommended the unportation of 
Negroes mto Hispaniola. The charge itself was first published thirty- 
five years after the death of Las Casas. All writers antecedent to Her- 
rera, and contemporary with him, are silent on the subject, although 
several of these were the avowed enemies of Las Casas. Herrcra's 
veracity on other points is much disputed, and he displays violent pre- 
judices against the man whom he accuses. It may be added, that he 
was greatly indebted to him for information as an historian of the Indies. 

In the numerous writings of Las Casas himself, still extant, there is 
not one word in favour of slavery of any kind, but they abound with 
reasoning and invective against it in every shape ; and among his elo- 
quent appeals, and comprehensive plans on behalf of the oppressed 
Indians, there is not a solitary hint in recommendation of the African 
Slave Trade. He only twice mentions the Negroes through all kis 



miiltifarious writings ; in one instance he merely names them as living 
in the islands, (in a manuscript in the National Library at Paris ;) 
and in the same work he proposes no other remedy for the miseries of 
the aboriginal inhabitants, than the suppression of the repartimientos, 
or divisions of the people, with the soil on which they were born. In 
another memorial, after detailing at great length the measures which 
ought to be pursued for the redress of the Indians, (the proper oppor- 
tunity, certainly, to advocate the Negro Slave Trade, if he approved 
of it,) he adds, — " The Indians are not more tormented by their masters 
and the different public officers, than by their servants and by the 
Negroes." 

The original accusation of Las Casas, translated from the words of 
Herrera, is as follows: — " The licentiate Bartholomew Las Casas, per- 
ceiving that his plans experienced on all sides great difficulties, and that 
the expectations which he had formed from his connection with the 
High Chancellor, and the favourable opinion the latter entertained of 
him, had not produced any effect, projected other expedients, such as, 
to procure for the Castilians established in the Indies a cargo of Negroes, 
to reheve the Indians in the culture of the earth and the labour of the 
mines ; also to obtain a great number of working men, (from Europe,) 
who should pass over into those regions with certain privileges, and on 
certain conditions, which he detailed." 

Let this statement be compared with Dr. Robertson's most exagge- 
rated account, avowedly taken from Herrera alone, and let every man 
judge for himself, whether one of the most zealous and indefatigable 
advocates of freedom that ever existed, " while he contended earnestly 
for the Uberty of the people born in one quarter of the globe, labov.rcd 
to enslave the inhabitants of another region, and, in his zeal to save the 
Americans from the yoke, pronounced it to be lawful and expedient to 
impose one slill heavier on the Africans." — Robertson's Historij of 
America, Vol. I. Part HI. But the circumstance connected by Dr. 
Robertson with this supposed schc7ne of Las Casas is unwarranted by 
any authority, and makes his own of no value. He adds — " The plan 
of Las Casas was adopted. Charles V. granted a patent to one of his 
Flemish favourites, containing an exclusive riglit of importing four 
thousand negroes into America." Herrera, the only author whom Dr. 
Robertson pretends to follow, does not, in any place, associate his ran- 
dom charge against Las Casas with this acknowledged and most ui- 
famous act. The crime of having first recommended the importation 
of African slaves into the American islands is attributed, by three writers 
of the life of Cardinal Ximenes, (who rendered liimself illustrious by 
his opposition to the trade in its infancy,) to Chievres, and by two 



NOTES TO VOL. I. m 



others to the Flemish nobility themselves, who obtained the monopoly 
aforementioned, and which was sold to some " Genoese merchants for 
25,000 ducats : and theij were the first who brought into a regular form 
that commerce for slaves between Africa and America, which has since 
been carried on to such an amazing extent." — It is unnecessary to say 
more on the subject. — A translation of Gregoire's defence of Las (/asas 
was published in 1803, by H. D. Symonds, Paternoster Row. 



THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 
Page 194. 

1 This passage, the reader will perceive, is an imitation of some 
verses in the fourteenth chapter of the Prophecy of Isaiah, which are 
applied to the fall of the King of Babylon. The following extract from 
Bishop Lowth's note on the original will elucidate the paraphrase: 
— " The regions of the Dead are laid open, and Hades is represented as 
rousing up the shades of the departed monarchs ; they rise from their 
thrones to meet the King of Babylon at his coming ; and insult him on 
his being reduced to the same low state of impotence and dissolution 
with themselves. ****** The image of the state of the Dead) 
or the Infernum Poeticura of the Hebrews, is taken from their custom 
of burying, those at least of the highest rank, in large sepulchral vaults 
hewn in the rock. Of this kind of sepulchres there are remains at Je- 
rusalem now extant ; and some that are said to be the sepulchres of the 
kings of Judah. See Maundrell, p. 76. You are to form to yourself 
the idea of an immense subterraneous vault, a vast gloomy cavern, all 
round the sides of which there are cells to receive the dead bodies : 
here the deceased monarchs lie in a distinguished sort of state, suitable 
to their former rank, each on his own couch, with his arms beside him, 
his sword at his head, and the bodies of his cliicfs and companions 
around him. » * * * * These illustrious shades rise at once from 
their couches, as from their thrones ; and advance to the entrance of the 
cavern to meet the King of Babylon, and to receive him with insults on 
his fall." — Lowth's Isaiah, xiv. 9, et scq. 



GREENLAND. 
Page 209. 
1 John Amos Comenius, one of the most learned as well as pious 
men of his age, was minister of the Brethren's congregation at Fulneck, 

31* 



NOTES TO VOL. I. 



in Moravia, from 1618 to 1627, when, the Protestant nobility and clergy 
being expatriated, he fled with a part of liis people through Silesia into 
Poland. On the summit of the mountains forming the boundary, he 
turned his sorrowful eyes towards Bohemia and Moravia, and kneeling 
down with his brethren there, implored God, with many tears, that he 
would not take away the light of his holy word from those two provmces, 
but preserve in them a remnant for himself. A remnant was saved. 



Page 239. 

2 Spenser introduces Prince Arthur as traversing the world in search 
of his mistress Gloriana, whom he had only seen in a dream. The dis- 
covery of a region in the west, by the Greenland Norwegians, about the 
year 1000, and intercourse maintained with it for 120 years afterwards, 
may be considered as the most curious fact or fable connected with the 
history of these colonists. The reason why it was called Wineland is 
given in the sequel. 

Page 243. 

3 The incidents alluded to in this clause are presumed to have occa- 
sioned the extinction of the Norwegian colonists on the western coast 
of Greenland. Crantz says, that tliere is a district on Ball's river, 
called Pissiksarbik, or the place of an-mvs; where it is beUeved, that the 
Skraellings and Norwegians fought a battle, in which the latter were 
defeated. The modem Greenlanders affirm, that the name is derived 
from the circumstance of the parties having shot their arrows at one 
another from opposite banks of the stream. Many riidera, or ruins of 
ancient buildings, principally supposed to have been churches, arc found 
along the coast from Disco Bay to Cape Farewell. 

Page 252. 

4 The principal phenomena described in this disruption of so im- 
mense a breadth of ice, are introduced on the authority of an authentic 
narrative of a journey on sledges along the coast of Labrador, by two 
Moravian missionaries and a number of Esquimaux, in the year 1782. 
The first incident in this canto, the destruction of the snow house, is 
partly borrowed from the same record. 

Page 253, 

5 The ice-bergs, both fixed and floating, present the most fantastic 
and magnificent forms, which an active imagination may easily convert 
into landscape scenery. Crantz says, that some of these look like 



NOTES TO VOL. I. 



churches, with pillars, arches, portals, and illuminated windows ; others 
like castles, with square and spiral turrets. A third class assumes the 
appearance of ships in full sail, to which pilots have occasionally gone 
out, for the purpose of conducting them into harbour ; many again re- 
semble large islands, with hill and dale, as well as villages, and even 
cities, built upon the margin of the sea. Two of these stood for many 
years in Disco Bay, which the Dutch whalers called Amsterdam and 
Haarlem. 

Page 254. 

6 Greenland has been supplied with fuel, from time immemorial, 
brought by the tide from the northern shores of Asia, and other regions, 
probably even from California, and the coast of America towards Behr- 
ing's Straits. This annual provision, however, has gradually been de- 
creasing for some years past [being partly intercepted by the accumula- 
tion of ice] on the shores of modern Greenland, towards Davis's Straits. 
Should it fail altogether, that country [like the east] must become unin- 
habitable ; as the natives themselves employ wood ui the construction of 
their houses, their boats, and their implements of fishing, hunting, and 
shooting, and could not find any adequate substitute for it at home. 

Page 258. 

7 The depopulation of Old Greenland is supposed to have been great- 
ly accelerated by the introduction of the plague, which, under the name 
of the Black Death, made dreadful havoc throughout Europe towards the 
close of the fourteenth century. 

Page 259. 

8 The Danish Chronicle says, that the Greenland colonists were tri- 
butary to the kings of Norway from the year 1023 ; soon after which 
they embraced Christianity. In its more flourishing period this province 
is stated to have been divided into a hundred parishes, under the superin- 
tendence of a bishop. From 1120 to 1408 the succession of seventeen 
bishops is recorded. In the last-mentioned year, Andrew, ordained bi- 
shop of Greenland by Askill, archbishop of Drontheim, sailed for his dio- 
cese, but whether he arrived there, or was cast away, was never known. 
To his imagined fate this episode alludes. 



TRANSLATIONS. 



Page 375. 
1 The simple and sublime original of these stanzas, with the fine 
air by Hummel, became the national song of Germany, and was sung 



by the soldiers especially, during the latter campaigns of the war, when 
Bonaparte was twice dethroned, and Europe finally delivered from 
French predominance. 

Page 380. 

2 Tliis miserable culprit had been a metallurgist of Brescia, who, at 
the instance of Guido, Alessandro, and Aginulpho, three nobles of Ro- 
mena, counterfeited the gold florin of Tuscany, which bore the impress 
of the Baptist's head. — Branda is a beautiful fountain at Siena. 

Page 382. 

3 The same comparison is used on another Uke occasion, with a sin- 
gular tlaough minute variation. 

And as an arrow hits the mark, before 

The cord hath ceased to tremble on the bow, 

Thus had we reach'd the second region. 

Del Paradiso, canto v. 

Page 390. 

4 Alluding, it is supposed, to the fact that Guido had forsaken 
poetry for philosophy, or preferred the latter so much to the former, as 
to think lightly of Virgil himself in comparison with Aristotle. 



POETICAL WOEKS 



JAMES MONTGOMERY, 

WITH A 

IHemoir of tl)e ^utljor, 

BY 

THE REV. RUFUS W. GRISWOLD. 

IN TWO VOLUMES. 

VOL. II. 



BOSTON: 

PHILLIPS, SAMPSON AND COMPANY. 

1853. 



CONTENTS. 



THOUGHTS ON WHEELS. 

Page 

No. I.— The Combat 13 

No. n.— The Car of Juggernaut 14 

No. ni.— The Inquisition 15 

No. IV.— The State Lottery 17 

No. v.— To Britain 25 

THE CLIMBING BOY'S SOLILOQUIES. 

Prologue. — A Word with Myself 31 

No. I.— The Complaint 33 

No. II.— The Dream 35 

No. III.— Easter-Monday at Sheffield 41 

SONGS OF ZION, BEING IMITATIONS OF THE 
PSALMS. 

Psalm 1 50 

Psalm III 51 

Psalm IV.— No. 1 52 

Psalm IV.— No. 2 52 

Psalm VIII 53 

Psalm XI 53 

Psalm XV. • 54 

Psalm XIX.— No. 1 55 

Psalm XIX.— No. 2 55 

Psalm XX 56 

Psalm XXIII 57 

Psalm XXIV.— No. 1 58 

Psalm XXIV.— No. 2 58 

Psalm XXIV.— No. 1. (The Second Version.) .... 59 

Psalm XXIV.— No. 2. (The Second Version.) ... 59 

Psalm XXVII.— No. 1 60 

Psalm XXVII.— No. 2 61 

Psalm XXIX • . . 62 

Psalm XXX 62 

Psalm XXXIX 64 

Psalm XLII.— No. 1 65 

Psalm XLII.— No. 2 66 

Psalm XLIIL— No. 3 • 66 

Psalm XLVI.— No. 1 67 



4 CONTENTS. 




Page 


Psalm XLVL— No. 2 .... 


. . . 68 


Psalm XLVII 


69 


Psalm XLVIII 


. 69 


Psalm LI 


70 


Psalm LXIII 


. 72 


Psalm LXIX 


72 


Psalm LXX 


. 73 


Psalm LXXI 


74 


Psalm LXXII 


. 75 


Psalm LXXIII 


77 


Psalm LXXVII 


. 78 


Psalm LXXX 


. • . . 80 


Psalm LXXXIV 


. 81 


Psalm XC 


82 


Psalm XCI 


. 83 


Psalm XCIII 


85 


Psalm XCV 


. 85 


Psalm C 


86 


Psalm cm 


. . . . 87 


Psalm CIV 


88 


Psalm C VII.— No. 1 


. 91 


Psalm C VII.— No. 2 . . . . 


91 


Psalm CVIL— No. 3 


. 92 


Psalm CVII.— No. 4 .... 


93 


Psalm CVIL— No. 5 


. 94 


Psalm CXIII 


95 


Psalm CXVI 


. 95 


Psalm CXVII 


. . . . 96 


Psalm CXXL- 


. 97 


Psalm CXXII 


. . . . 98 


Psalm CXXIV 


. 98 


Psalm CXXV 


99 


Psalm CXXVI 


. 100 


Psalm CXXX. ' 


. 101 


Psalm CXXXI 


. 102 


Psalm CXXXIL— No. 1 . . . . 


. . . . 102 


Psalm CXXXIL— So. 2 . . . . 


. 103 


Psalm CXXXIII 


. . . . 103 


Psalm CXXXIV 


. 104 


Psalm CXXXVII 


. 104 


Psalm CXXXVIII 


. 105 


Psalm CXXXIX 


. 106 


Psalm CXLI 


. 107 


Psalm CXLII 


. . 108 


Psalm CXLIII 


. 109 


Psalm CXLV 


. 110 


Psalm CXLVI 


. 110 


Psalm CXLVIII 


111 



Page 
NARRATIVES. 

Farewell to War 113 

Lord Falkland's Dream, a. p. 1643 ;i5 

The Patriot's Pass-word 125 

The Voyage of the Blind 128 

An Every-Day Tale 136 

A Tale without a Name . 140 

A Snake in the Grass 154 

The Cast-away Ship 158 

The Sequel 161 

TRIBUTARY POEMS. 

To the Memory of the late Richard Reynolds .... 164 

I. — The Death of the Righteous 164 

II.— The Memory of the Just 165 

III.— A Good Man's Monument 168 

To the Memory of Rowland Hodgson, Esq., of Sheffield . . 171 
" Occupy till I come." On the Death of the late Joseph Butter- 
worth, Esq 175 

In Memory of the Rev. James Harvey 177 

To the Memory of the late Joseph Browne, of Lothersdale . 179 

To the Memory of the Rev. Thomas Spencer, of Liverpool . 181 
The Christian Soldier. Occasioned by the sudden Death of the 

Rev. Thomas Taylor 184 

A Recollection of Mary F 185 

InMemoryofE. B., formerly E. R 186 

In Memory of E. G 187 

M. S. To the Memory of " A Female whom Sickness had Re- 
conciled to the Notes of Sorrow" 188 

On the Royal Infant 193 

A Mother's Lament on the Death of her Infant Daughter . . 194 

The Widow and the Fatherless 195 

MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 

The Lyre 197 

Remonstrance to Winter 200 

Round Love's Elysian Bowers 201 

Lines written under a Drawing of Yardley Oak . . . 202 
Written for a Society whose Motto was " Friendship, Love, and 

Truth" - . .203 

Religion. An occasional Hymn 204 

The Joy of Grief 205 

The Battle of Alexandria 207 

The Pillow 211 

Ode to the Volunteers of Britain 215 

The Vigil of St. Mark 218 

Hannah 223 

A Field Flower 225 



i 



CONTENTS. 



Page 

The Snow-drop 226 

An Epitaph 229 

The Ocean 230 

The Common Lot 235 

The Harp of Sorrow 236 

Pope's Willow 238 

A Walk in Spring 241 

To Agnes 245 

A Deed of Darkness 246 

The Dial 248 

Emblems 249 

A Message from the Moon 251 

A Bridal Benison 253 

The Blackbird 254 

The Myrtle 255 

A Death-Bed 256 

Dale Abbey 257 

In Bereavement - . . . . 258 

Coronation Ode for Queen Victoria 259 

The Wild Pink, on the Wall of Malmesbury Abbey . . .260 

Parting Words 263 

The Roses 264 

Elijah in the Wilderness ' . 265 

Stanzas on the Death of the late Rev. Thomas Rawson Taylor . 269 

Christ the Purifier 270 

" A Certain Disciple" 271 

The Communion of Saints 272 

" Perils by the Heathen" 273 

A Midnight Thought 275 

The Peak Mountains 276 

To Ann and Jane 281 

Transmigrations 282 

Chatterton 284 

A Daughter (C. M.) to her Mother, on her Birth-Day . . .285 
On Finding the Feathers of a Linnet scattered on the Ground . 288 
Occasional Ode for the Anniversary of the Royal British System 

of Education 290 

Departed Days : A Rhapsody 291 

The Bible 294 

The Wild Rose 295 

The Time-Piece ' 298 

A Mother's Love 300 

The Visible Creation 303 

Reminiscences 303 

The Reign of Spring 304 

The Reign of Summer 307 

Instruction 316 

A Night in a Stage-Coach 317 



Page 
Incognita: On viewing the Picture of an unknown Lady . . 320 

Winter-Lightning 323 

The Little Cloud 324 

Abdallah and Sabat 329 

Questions and Answers 334 

The Alps ; A Reverie 335 

The Bridal and the Burial 339 

Youth Renewed 340 

The Daisy in India 341 

The Pilgrim 343 

Robert Burns 344 

The Stranger and his Friend 345 

Friends 347 

A Theme for a Poet 348 

Night 351 

Aspirations of Youth 353 

A Hermitage 354 

Inscription under the Picture of an aged Negro Woman . . 355 

The Adventure of a Star 356 

On Planting a Tulip-Root 359 

The Drought. Written in the Summer of 1826 . . . .360 

The Falling Leaf 362 

Thoughts and Images 363 

The Ages of Man 366 

The Grave 367 

Bolehill Trees 371 

The Old Man's Song 373 

The Glow- Worm 374 

The Mole-Hill 375 

A Voyage Round the World 381 

Humility 387 

Birds 388 

The Gentianella 396 

A Lucid Interval 397 

Worms and Flowers 399 

The Recluse 400 

Time : A Rhapsody 401 

To a Friend, wuh a Copy of the foregoing Lucubration . . 403 

The Retreat 404 

The Lily. To a Young Lady, E. P 407 

The Sky-Lark. Addressed to a Friend 408 

The Fixed Stars 409 

A Cry from South Africa. On building a Chapel at Cape Town, 

for the Negro Slaves of the Colony, in 1828 . . .410 

Speed the Prow 412 

The Cholera Mount. Lines on the Burying-Place for Patients 
who died of Cholera Morbus ; a pleasant Eminence in 
Sheffield Park 413 



i 



Page 

To Mary 416 

Short-Hand. Stanzas addressed to E. P 416 

To my Friend George Bennet, Esq., of Sheffield . . . 417 
One Warning more. Written for Distribution on a Race-Course, 

1821 420 

A Riddle. Addressed to E. R. 1820 421 

The Tombs of the Fathers 422 

The Sun-Flower 426 

ForJ. S. A Preamble to her Album 427 

To Cynthia : A Young Lady, unknown to the Author, who, by 
Letter, requested "a Stanza," or " a few Lines in his Hand- 
writing" 428 

On a Watch-Pocket worked by A. L 429 

An Infant's Album 431 

To Margaret; a little Girl, who begged to have some Verses 

from the Author, at Scarborough, in 1814 .... 433 

The blank Leaf 434 

The Gnat. Written with Pencil round an Insect of that kind, 
which had been accidentally crushed, and remained fixed on 

a blank Page of a Lady's Album 434 

Morna 435 

The Valentine Wreath 439 

The Widow. Written at the Request of a Lady, who furnished 

several of the Lines and the Plan of the whole . . 440 
Motto to " a Poet's Portfolio." (Fragment of a Page of Oblivion) 442 

At Home in Heaven 443 

The Veil 446 

Heaven in Prospect 446 

On the First Leaf of Miss J. 's Album 447 

The Sand and the Rock ........ 448 

" Lovest thou Me" . . .451 

Garden Thoughts. On Occasion of a Christian Assembly in the 
Grounds of a Gentleman at York, for the Purpose of pro- 
moting Missions among the Heathen .... 452 
To Mr. and Mrs. T., of York, with the foregoing Stanzas . . 454 

The Field of the World 455 

Farewell to a Missionary 456 

" The Prisoner of the Lord." A Sabbath Hymn for a sick 

Chamber 457 

An After-Thought 458 

Our Saviour's Prayers 459 

Reminiscence 462 

Evening Time 463 

The Lot of the Righteous 464 

A Benediction for a Baby 466 

Evening Song. For the Sabbath-Day 467 

A Wedding Wish. To Mr. and Mrs. H 468 



THOUGHTS ON WHEELS. 



DuHiNO the greater part of the last fortj' years it has been my privilege 
to be connected, rather as an auxiliary than a principal, in many a plan for 
lessening the sum of human misery at home and abroad, wilh three gen- 
tlemen of this neighbourhood, Mr. Samuel Roberts, Mr. George Bennet, 
and Mr. Rowland Hodgson. Of the two latter I need not speak here, 
because proofs of my esteem for each, distinctly, will be found in another 
part of this collection. With Mr. Roberts, however, it happened, that 1 have 
been more particularly and actively concerned on occasions rather general 
than local, such as the questions of the Slave Trade and Slavery, the State 
Lottery, and the practice of employing climbing boys to sweep chimneys. In 
thise, the zeal, the energy, and the indefatigability of my friend far surpassed 
any corresponding qualifications which 1 could exercise in aid of the frequent 
causes in which we have been engaged together. Though, like Jehonadab's 
with Jehu's, my heart was always with his heart, it was not in every enterprise 
that I had the courage to accept his invitation to "come up to (him) into the 
chariot;" for the adversary's watchmen, descrying his approach from their 
walls, might truly exclaim, "His driving is like the driving of the son of Nimshi, 
for he driveth furiously." When, however, I could not do this, I girded myself 
up to run alongside of him, till I could no more keep pace with his speed : I then 
fcillowed him as far as my breath and strength would carry me. Among those 
who know him best, and esteem him proportionably, though I may perhaps call 
myself the foremost, — having, more than any other individual, had opportunities 
of understanding his motives, and judging his public conduct by these, — I must 
not attempt, in this place, "to give him honour due," further than by simply re- 
cording my own obligations to him, for having, by his intrepidity and example 
on some trying occasions, caused me to do a little less harm, and a little more 
good in iny generation, than I should otherwise have had forbearance in the 
one case to avoid, or fortitude in the other to undertake. 

This influence was more especially ascendant over my natural indolence and 
timidity, in our joint efforts through a series of years to rouse the country, and 
to persuade the legislature against "the State Lottery" as a system of legalized 
gambling, and "the employment of climbing boys to sweep chimneys as a sys- 
tem of home-slavery." 

In reference to the former I rnay here state, that it had been the practice, as 
long as I can remember, for the publishers of newspapers to procure lottery 
tickets for persons who applied for them, from any of the offices with which 
they had current accounts for advertising. 

From 1794, when I entered upon the property of the She^ffield Iris, till 1801 or 
1S02, I was in the habit of executing such commissions to a very small amount 
annually. I know not what lottery speculations may have been made other- 
wise in this neighbourhood ; but if my sales were the standard of probabilities 
in so obscure a case, little of the money that was got upon the anvil was thrown 
into the fire, for the purchase of blanks, where prizes were contemplated in re- 
version. 

Once, however, about the above-mentioned date, I had the misfortune to sell 
the sixteenth ofa ticket which turned upa yitize of twenty tli02isand pounds. The 
price to be paid for the share, I think, was 23s. 6rf., and the person who bespoke 
I' had left a guinea towards payment, as the market price could not be ascer- 
tained till the voucher came from London. Accordingly I received it with a few 



THOUGHTS ON WHEELS. 



others which had been ordered in like manner, and pledges deposited. These, 
with the exception of that particular one, were duly fetched by the parties who 
had bespoken them. In those days the registering of tickets and shares was en- 
tirely done in the metropolitan offices, the names and addresses of the adven- 
turers being transmitted from the country by their respective correspondents. 
Whatever then might be the fate or the fortune of the numbers delivered by me, 
I knew nothing of the event unless the buyers themselves informed me, which 
they usually did when the prizes wore small ones, and almost as usually ex- 
changed them for new ventures in the current or next lottery, paying the differ- 
ence, vvliich was necessarily on the losing side, (the schemes being ingeniously 
contrived to effect that,) till a blank made amends for all,— if it happened to 
cure the lottery-fit, though that kind of fever being intermittent, patients once 
affected were fearfully liable to returns. 

In the case above mentioned, the share remained week after week uncalled 
for in my desk, while the drawing continued, and till it was nearly at an end. 
In fact, I had given it up as a bad speculation of my own, so far as what was due 
upon it had been hazarded to a stranger, concluding that it must have been 
drawn a blank, and that my customer would take no more trouble about it. I 
well recollect throwing it aside among some indifferent papers, and muttering to 
myself, — "There lies half-a-crown." One evening, however, a man from a vil- 
lage in Derbyshire called upon me in considerable agitation, and presented an 
open letter addressed to a female in whose name the share had been registered 
at the office (Nicholson's) in London, announcing that the ticket had been 
drawn a prize of twenty thousand pounds, with a hint, that, when the lady re- 
ceived the money, it was hoped she would remember the clerks in the otfice. 
Till then the said lady did not so much as know the number of which a sixteenth 
had been thus registered to her. I was not a little bewildered myself at first, 
scarcely remembering when I had last seen the precious scrap of paper ; and, 
doubting whether the intelligence were not a hoax, and whether the applicant, 
who professed himself a relation of the owner, were a true man. But, having 
found the share, and ascertained the other points, I delivered it into the messen- 
ger's hands, and received the small balance due to me upon it. I was after- 
wards told, that the guinea which had been paid to me in advance was put into 
the lottery "for luck's sake," having been found unexpectedly in a paper with 
some sugar-candy, in a neglected drawer. The fortunate recoverer of the un- 
redeemed prize that had fallen to her, like one of the forgotten things which the 
moon has been said to contain, 

" " Where heroes' wils are kept in ponderous vases, 

And beaui' in snulV boxes and I weezer-cases," 

{Rape of the Lock, canto v.) 

proved to be a very respectable matron in good circumstances, and of prudent 
habits. Instead of eagerly seizing the spoil at the expense of the small discount, 
she waited till the money was full due, and never afterwards, so far as I was 
concerned, risked more than the price of another sixteentli at once in a lottery 
or two following. 

But the strangeness of this great event in provincial lottery annals did not end 
here. The successful ticket had been distributed, if I rightly remember, entirely 
in sixteenths, and sold in different parts of the kingdom. This being blazoned 
in all the newspapers, occasioned an extraordinary demand for shares in the 
ensuing lottery, and mine being deemed "a Lucky Office," commissions came 
pouring upon me in a manner and nniltitudc beyond precedent. These I was 
enabled to supply on a new plan, which, I confess, I thought very hazardous to 
the metropolitan office keepers, who, availing tlieuiselves of this "tide" iu the 
sea of bubbles, took it "at the flood," not doubting that it would "lead on to for- 
tune" in their "affairs." Accordingly they appointed agencies throughout the 
country, and one of these being offered to me by a first-rate house, I accepted it 
as a mere matter of business, and for several years I was in the habit of ilis- 



THOUGHTS ON WHEELS. 



posing from twenty to fifty times as many tickets and sliares as I had ever done 
before. Besides the small commission on the amount sold, being from that time 
allowed the perquisite for registering the numbers myself, and communicating 
the results to my customers, I received from day to day the lists of the draw- 
ings, and became practically acquainted with the risks and the returns,— indeed 
so well acquainted, that, during the term of my agency, I was never for a mo- 
ment tempted to hazard a shilling on a turn of the wheels for myself. On one 
occasion only, when the drawing was to be closed on an early day, and I had to 
send back to my principals the unsold shares in my hands, I retained two-eighths 
in expectation of having calls for them before the last drawing. One was sold, 
the other remained with me, but proving a small prize I escaped comparatively 
unscathed. 

Now of all the thousands in every variety of numbers which passed through 
my hands, including sold and returned, I do not recollect more than three shares 
of prizes above 25i.— namely, two of 501. and a third of 1101. ; the former dis- 
posed of, the latter sent back. I thought at first that the rage for this losing 
game would soon abate of itself I was mistaken; and though after a year or 
two it was less prodigally and promiscuously, yet it was more steadily pursued 
by regular customers, to whom the habitual stimulus became as necessary to 
provoke and appease, while in both cases it mocked, the "ouri sacra fames," as 
dram-drinking and opium-eating are to diseased appetites of another kind. In 
addition to these perennials, there was an annual succession of inexperienced 
votaries of wealth, who came and tried, and withdrew, when they had grown 
wiser or warier at a reasonable cost. And here I must observe that the grosser 
evils of lotteries, flagrant as they were in the metropolis, came not wiihin my 
observation liere; what I knev/ personally of the original sin of the system was 
learned by its ordinary effects. My dealings were principally with persons in 
moderate circumstances, yet with a considerable proportion of work-people anil 
others who might have invested their small savings (if savings they were) on 
nuitli better securities than the notes which my bank issued. It was one of the 
lame pleas for the State Lottery in Parliament, that after the suppression of the 
infamous insurance-offices — which never existed here — there remained no longer 
a snare to tempt the poor to take this royal way to riches, the lowest fraction of 
a ticket in the market being beyond their power of purchase. Whatever the 
case might be in London, the rich in this neighbourhood, if they speculated at 
all, did not come to nie. One of these, a friend of mine, told me that he had 
obtained an eighth of a 20,000/., and I heard of another who was said to have 
had a sixteenth of a 10,000/. prize. On this part of the subject, from an article in 
my newspaper of March 25, 1817, in which I questioned some statements made 
by high authorities in the House of Commons, I may quote a memorandum, that, 
in three lotteries drawn in 1803, I "sold, Whole Tickets — not one; Halves — one; 
QuiiTtsTS—ticenfy; Eighths — eighty-eight; Sixtep.nlhs— five htcndred and sixty- 
six! and in previous years far greater numbers of the latter; many, very many 
of which were bought by poor people." 

Familiarity with some kinds of sin deadens the consciousness of it. This was 
not the case with me in reference to the State Lottery. It was familiarity with 
it which convinced me of the sin of dealing in its deceptive wares. I was occa- 
sionally surprised to notice the different kinds of money which were brought to 
nie by persons of the humbler class,— hoarded guineas, old crowns, half crowns, 
and fine impressions of smaller silver coins, at a time when bank-paper, Spanish 
dollars, and tokens of inferior standard, issued by private individuals and com- 
panies, formed a kind of »7io6-currency throughout the realm, instead of the ster- 
ling issues of the Royal Mint. These, like the guinea of my Derbyshire matron, 
were ventured "for the sake of luck," in several instances by poor women who 
had inherited them from their parents, received them as birth or wedding-day 
gifts, saved them for their children's thrift-pots, or laid them up against a rainy 
day for family wants or sickness. With these they came to bii}' hope, and I sold 



THOUGHTS ON WHEELS, 



them disappointment .'—It was this very thought passing through my mind like a 
flash of lightning, in the very words, and leaving an indelible impression, (deep- 
ening with every recurrence of the haunting idea,) which decided a long-medi- 
tated but often procrastinated purpose; and I said to myself, at length, "I will 
immediately give up this traffic of delusion." I did so, and from that mon)ent 
never sold another share. 

This, however, was only cutting off the left hand of a profitable sin, while 
with the right I was still accepting the hire of iniquity. The proprietors of 
newspapers do not deeuj themselves responsible for the contents of advertise- 
ments which appear on their pages, so long as these are free from libellous, im- 
moral, or blasphemous matter. During the palmy days of the State Lottery, and 
even when it began to fall into disrepute, the office keepers were among the 
most liberal contributors of such precious articles to the public journals. Tlie 
columns of mine were never much burdened with these opima spolia, — wealth 
won without labour of the hands or the brains, gratuitously bestowed, collected 
at little risk, and small additional expense in the economy of the printing-office. 
Lottery advertisements, therefore, formed a considerable proportion of the very 
moderate amount of pecuniary means, by which I was enabled, under many dis- 
advantages, some local, and others personal, to maintain my paper at all. But 
when my friend Mr. Roberts and I, several years after my relinquishment of 
lottery sales, determined to attack the great state evil itself, with open, uncom- 
promising hostility, I felt that I could not consistently, nor indeed honestly, sup- 
port him in his plans of aggression, while I was an actual accessory before the 
fact to the mischiefs which it was perpetrating throughout the length and breadth 
of the land, and especially, so far as I was implicated, within the range of my 
editorial influence. The question had long troubled me in secret; but, as in the 
former case, a final decision upon it was deferred, till my friend one day une.x- 
pectedly attacked me with a recommendation to renounce all connection with 
''the accursed thing," which we both had now made up our minds to hold up to 
public abhorrence and reprobation. The counsel was hard to a person in my 
circumstances : conscience and cupidity had a sharp conflict ; but the battle was 
not a drawn one ; the better principle prevailed; and after the autumn of 1816 
I never admitted another lottery advertisement into my paper. Nor did I ever, 
for one moment, repent the sacrifice. 

From that time till the abandonment of the State Lottery by government 
itself in 182i, Mr. Roberts and I, in various ways, but principally by paragraphs 
and philippics in my columns, and pamphlets from my press, waged a desultory 
warfare with those ministers of the day and their supporters in Parliament who 
persisted in employing these unhallowed means of recruiting the revenue. With 
the late Lord Lyttelton (then Mr. Lyltelton) and other members of the House of 
Commons who held the same sentiments as ourselves on the subject, we had 
frequent correspondence ; nor did the Chancellor of the Exchequer (otherwise 
one of the most upright and conscientious statesmen of the age) escape the an- 
noyance of our remonstrances and solicitations. In March, 1817, we promoted 
a petition to Parliament from Sheffield against this national nuisance. Whether 
this example was followed at that time by any other towns I do not remember. 
We know, however, that our various labours were not altogether in vain, — but 
that two obscure individuals in a remote part of the kingdom, by strenuous per- 
severance in advocating a good cause, contributed something (however little it 
may have been) towards the removal of the greatest plague that ever infested 
the country in the shape of a ta.\, upon the poverty, the morals, and the happi- 
ness of the people. 

In 1817, Mr. Roberts published The State Lottery, a Dream, a work of startling 
eccentricity in its plan, and no small ingenuity in the execution. Its frontis- 
piece, representing M Petty State Lottery within the walls of Christ's Hospital, 
in which not the drawers only, but all the adventurers, were children of that 
venerable establishment, was not without its effect in abating one of the most 



THOUGHTS ON WHEELS. 



plausible but pernicious exhibitions at Guildhall and elsewhere, in the annual 
pantomime of The Orand State Lottery. 

My Thoughts on Wheels were but the glimmering tail of my friend's por- 
tentous comet. The latter, having long ago passed its perihelion, is no more 
visible in the literary hemisphere; and the former would have disappeared with 
it, had not the last section, the address To Britain, been deemed worthy of pre- 
servation by judges more competent to decide upon its claims than the public 
will allow an author to be in his own case. 



October 20, 1840. 



NO. I. THE COMBAT. 



Of old when fiery warriors met, 
On edge of steel their hves were set ; 
Eye watching eye, shield crossing shield. 
Foot wedged to foot, they fought the field, 
Dealt and withstood as many strokes 
As might have fell'd two forest-oaks, 
Till one, between the harness-joint, 
Felt the resistless weapon's point 
Gluick through his heart, — and in a flood 
Pour'd his hot spirit with his blood. 

The victor, rising from the blow 
That laid his brave assailant low. 
Then blush'd not from his height to bend. 
Foully a galknt deed to end ; 
But whirl'd in fetters round the plain, 
Whirl'd at his chariot wheels, the slain ; 
Beneath the silent curse of eyes. 
That look'd for vengeance to the skies ; 
While shame, that could not reach the dead, 
Pour'd its whole vial on his head. 

Who falls in honourable strife 
Surrenders nothing but his life ; 
Who baselj^ triumphs casts away 
The glory of the well-won day ; 
— Rather than feel the joy he feels. 
Commend me to his chariot Wheels. 



THOUGHTS ON WHEELS. 



NO. II. THE CAR OF JUGGERNAUT. 

On plains beneath the morning star, 
Lo ! Jugg-ernaut's stupendous car ; 
So high and menacing its size, 
The Tower of Babel seems to rise ; 
Darkening the air, its shadow spreads 
O'er thrice an hundred thousand heads ; 
Darkening the soul, it strikes a gloom. 
Dense as the night beyond the tomb. 
Full in mid-heaven, when mortal eye 
Up this huge fabric climbs the sky, 
The Idol scowls, in dragon-pride. 
Like Satan's conscience deified ; 
— Satan himself would scorn to ape 
Divinity in such a shape. 

Breaking the billows of the crowd. 
As countless, turbulent, and loud 
As surges on the windward shore, 
That madly foam, and idly roar ; 
Th' unwieldy wain compels its course, 
Crushing- resistance down by force ; 
It creaks, and groans, and grinds along, 
Midst shrieks and prayers, — midst dance and song ; 
With orgies in the eye of noon. 
Such as would turn to blood the moon ; 
Impieties so bold, so black. 
The stars to shun them would reel back ; 
And secret horrors, Avhich the Sun 
Would put on sackcloth to see done. 
Thrice happy they, whose headlong souls. 
Where'er th' enormous ruin rolls, 
Cast their frail bodies on the stones. 
Pave its red track with crashing bones. 
And pant and struggle for the fate 
— To die beneath the sacred weight. 

" O fools and mad !" your Christians cry ; 
Yet wise, methinks, are those who die : 



THOUGHTS ON WHEELS, 



For me, — if Juggernaut were God, 
Rather than writhe beneath his rod : 
Rather than hve his devotee, 
And bow to such a brute the knee ; 
Rather than be his favourite priest, 
Wallow in wantonness, and feast 
On tears and blood, on groans and cries, 
The fume and fat of sacrifice ; 
Rather than share his love, — or wrath ; 
I'd fling my carcass in his path, 
And almost bless his name, to feel 
The murdering mercy of his Avheel. 



NO. III. THE INQUISITION. 

There was in Christendom, of yore, 

— And would to heaven it were no more ! — 

There was an Inquisition-Court, 

Where priestcraft made the demons sport : 

— Priestcraft, — in form a giant monk, 

With wine of Rome's pollutions drunk. 

Like captive Samson, bound and bhnd. 

In chains and darkness of the mind, 

There shoAv'd such feats of strength and skill 

As made it charity to kill. 

And well the blow of death might pass 

For what he call'd it — coup de grace ; 

While in his httle hell on earth. 

The foul fiends quaked amidst their mirth : — 

But not hke him, who to the skies 

Turn'd the dark embers of his eyes, 

(Where lately burn'd a fire divine. 

Where still it burn'd, but could not shine,) 

And won by violence of prayer, 

(Hope's dying accents in despair,) 



THOUGHTS ON WHEELS. 



Power to demolish, from its base, 

Dasfon's proud fane, on Dagon's race ; 

Not thus like Samson ; — false of heart, 

The tonsured juggler play'd his part, 

God's law in God's own name made void, 

Men for their Saviour's sake destroy'd, 

Made pure religion his pretence 

To rid the earth of innocence ; 

While Spirits from th' infernal flood 

Cool'd their parch'd tongues in martyrs' blood, 

And half forgot their stings and flames 

In conning, at those hideous games. 

Lessons, — which he who taught should know 

How well they had been learn'd below. 

Among the engines of his power 
Most dreaded in the trying hour. 
When impotent were fire and steel, 
All but almighty was the Wheel, 
Whose harrowing revolution wrung 
Confession from the slowest tongue ; 
From joints unlock'd made secrets start. 
Twined with the cordage of the heart ; 
From muscles in convulsion drew 
Knowledge the sufferer never knew ; 
From failing flesh, in Nature's spite. 
Brought deeds that ne'er were done to light ; 
From snapping sinews wrench'd the lie. 
That gain'd the victim leave to die ; 
When self-accused, — condemn'd at length. 
His only crime was want of strength ; 
From holy hands with joy he turn'd, 
And kiss'd the stake at which he burn'd. 
But from the man of soul subhme. 
Who lived above the world of time. 
Fervent in faith, in conscience clear, 
Who knew to love, — but not to fear ; 
When every artifice of pain 
Was wasted on his limbs in vain. 



THOUGHTS ON WHEELS. 



And baffled cruelty could find 
No hidden passage to his mind, 
The Wheel extorted naught in death, 
Except — forgiveness, and his breath. 

Such a victorious death to die 
Were prompt translation to the sky : 
— Yet with the weakest, I would meet 
Racks, scourges, flames, and count them sweet ; 
Nay, might I choose, I would not 'scape 
"The question," put in any shape. 
Rather than sit in judgment there. 
Where the stern bigot fills the chair : 
— Rather than turn his torturing Wheel, 
Give me its utmost stretch to feel. 



NO. IV. THE STATE LOTTERY. 

Escaped from ancient battle-field. 

Though neither ivith nor on my shield : 

Escaped — how terrible the thought 

Even of escape ! — from Juggernaut ; 

Escaped from tenfold worse perdition 

In dungeons of the Inquisition ; 

Oh Avith what ecstasy I stand 

Once more on Albion's refuge-land ! 

Oh with what gratitude I bare 

My bosom to that island-air. 

Which tyrants gulp and cease to be. 

Which slaves inhale and slaves are free ! 

For though the wheels, behind my back. 

Still seem to rumble in my track, 

Their sound is music on the breeze ; 

I dare them all to cross the seas : 

— Nay, should they reach our guarded coast, 

Like Pharaoh's chariots and his host. 



THOUGHTS ON AVHEELS. 



Monks, Brahmins, warriors, swoln and dead, 
Axles and orbs in Avrecks were spread. 

And are there on this holy ground 
No wheels to trail the vanquish'd found ? 
None, framed the living bones to break. 
Or rend the nerves for conscience-sake ? 
No : — Britons scorn th' unhallow'd touch. 
They will not use, nor suffer such ; 
Alike they shun, with fearless heart, 
The victim's and tormentor's part. 

Yet here are wheels of feller kind, 
To drag in chains the captive mind ; 
To crush, beneath their horrid load, 
Hearts panting prostrate on the road ; 
To wind desire from spoke to spoke, 
And break the spirit stroke by stroke. 

Where Gog and Magog, London's pride. 
O'er city bankruptcies preside ; 
Stone-blind at nisi prius sit. 
Hearken stone-deaf to lawyers' wit ; 
Or scowl on men, that play the beasts 
At Common Halls and Lord Mayors' feasts. 
When venison or the public cause. 
Taxes or turtle, stretch their jaws : 
There, — in a whisper be it said, 
Lest honest Beckford shake his head ; 
Lest Chatham, with indignant cheek. 
Start from his pedestal and speak ; 
Lest Chatham's son in marble groan, 
As if restored to skin and bone ;* 
There, — speak, — speak out, — abandon fear ; 
Let both the dead and hving hear ; 
— The dead, that they may blush for shame 
Amidst their monumental fame ; 
— The living, that, forewarn'd of fate. 
Conscience may force them, ere too late, 

* These lines refer to the statues of British worthies which adorn tlie Guilii- 
hall of London. ' 



THOUGHTS ON WHEELS. 



Those Wheels of infamy to shun, 
Which thousands touch, and are undone. 

There, — built by legislative hands, 
On Christian ground, an altar stands. 
— " Stands ? gentle Poet, tell me where ?" 
Go to Guildhall: — " It stands not there T"" 
True ; — 'tis my brain that raves and reels 
Whene'er it turns on Lottery Wheels ; 
Such things in youth can I recall 
Nor think of thee, — of thee, Guildhall ? 
Where erst I play'd with glittering schemes, 
And lay entranced in golden dreams ; 
Bright round my head those bubbles broke, 
Poorer from every dream I woke ; 
Wealth came, — but not the wealth I sought ; 
Wisdom was wealth to me ; and taught 
My feet to miss thy gates, — that lay, 
Like toll-bars on the old "broad way," 
Where pilgrims paid, — oh grief to tell ! 
Tribute for going down to hell. 

Long on thy floor an altar stood. 
To human view unstain'd with blood. 
But red and foul in Heaven's pure eyes. 
Groaning with infant sacrifice, 
From year to year ; — till sense or shame. 
Or some strange cause without a name, 
— 'Twas not the cry of innocence, — 
Drove such abomination thence : 
Thence drove it, — but destroy'd it not ; 
It blackens some obscurer spot ; 
Obscurer, — yet so well defined. 
Thither the Wind might lead the blind, 
While heralds shout in every ear, 
"This is the temple, — worship here." 
Thither the deaf may read their way ; 
'Tis plain ; — io find it, go astray ! 
Thither the lame, on wings of paper. 
May come to nothing, hke a vapour ; 



THOUGHTS ON WHEELS. 

Thither may all the world repair ; 
A word, a wish, will waft you there ; 
And, O so smooth and steep the track, 
'Tis worth your life to venture back ; 
Easy the step to Cooper^s Hall,* 
As headlong from a cliff to fall ; 
Hard to recover from the shock, 
As broken-limb'd to climb a rock. 

There, built by legislative hands, 
Our country's shame, an altar stands ; 
Not votive brass, nor hallow'd stone, 
Humbly inscribed — " To God unknown ;" 
Though sure, if earth afford a space 
For such an altar, here's the place : 
— Not breathing incense in a shrine. 
Where human art appears divine. 
And man by his own skill hath wrought 
So bright an image of his thought. 
That nations, barbarous or refined. 
Might worship there th' immortal mind, 
That gave their ravish'd eyes to see 
A meteor glimpse of Deity ; 
A ray of Nature's purest light. 
Shot through the gulf of Pagan night, 
Dazzhng, — but leaving darkness more 
Profoundly bhnding than before. 
— Ah ! no such power of genius calls 
Sublime devotion to these walls ; 
No pomp of art, surpassing praise, 
Britannia's altar here displays : 
A money-changer's table, — spread 
With hieroglyphics, black and red. 
Exhibits, on deceitful scrolls, 
" The price of Tickets," — and of Souls ; 
For thus are Souls to market brought, 
Barter'd for vanity, — for naught ; 

* Where tlie State Lottery was drawn for many years. 



THOUGHTS ON WHEELS. 



Till the poor venders find the cost, 
— Time to eternal ages lost ! 

No sculptured idol decks the place, 
Of such excelling form and face, 
That Grecian pride might feign its birth 
A statue fallen from heaven to earth : 
The goddess here is best design'd, 
— A flimsy harlot, bold and blind ; 
Invisible to standers-by. 
And yet in everybody's eye ! 
Fortune her name ; — a gay deceiver. 
Cheat as she may, the crowd believe her ; 
And she, abuse her as they will. 
Showers on the crowd her favours still : 
For 'tis the bliss of both to be 
Themselves unseen, and not to see ; 
Had she discernment, — pride would scout 
The homage of her motley rout ; 
Were she reveal'd, — the poorest slave 
Would blush to be her luckiest knave. 

Not good OLD FORTUNE here we scorn, 
In classic fable heavenly born : 
She who for nothing deigns to deal 
Her blanks and prizes from One Wheel ; 
And who, like Justice, wisely Wind, 
Scatters her bounties on mankind 
With such a broad impartial aim. 
If none will praise her, none should blame ; 
For were ten thousand fancies tried. 
Wealth more discreetly to divide 
Among the craving race of man. 
Wit could not frame a happier plan. 

Here, 'tis her Counterfeit, who reigns 
O'er haunted heads and moon-struck brains 
A Two-xolieeV d Jade, admired by sots. 
Who flings,/or cash in hand, her lots 
To those, who, fain " their luck to try," 
Sell Hope, and Disappointment buy. 



THOUGHTS ON WHEELS. 



The wily sorceress here reveals, 

With proud parade, her mystic Wheels ; 

— Those Wheels, on which the nation runs 

Over the morals of its Sons ; 

— Those Wheels, at which the nation draws 

Through shouting streets its broken laws ! 

Engines of plotting Fortune's skill 

To lure, entangle, torture, kill. 

Behold her, in imperial pride. 

King, Lords, and Commons at her side ; 

Arm'd with authority of state, 

The public peace to violate ; 

More might be told, — but not by me 

Must this " eternal blazon" be. 

Between her Wheels the Phantom stands, 

With Syren voice, and Harpy hands : 

She turns th' enchanted axle round ; 

Forth leaps the " twentv thousand pound !" 

That "twenty thousand" one has got; 

But twenty thousand more have not. 

These curse her to her face, deplore 

Their loss, then — take her word once more ; 

Once more deceived, they rise like men 

Bravely resolved — to try again ; 

Again they fail ; — again trapann'd. 

She mocks them with her sleight of hand ; 

Still fired with rage, with avarice steel'd, 

Perish they may, but never yield ; 

They woo her till their latest breath, 

Then snatch their prize — a blank in death. 

The priests, that in her temple wait. 
Her minor ministers of fate. 
Like Dian's silversmith's of old. 
True to the craft that brings them gold, 
Lungs, limbs, and pens unwearied ply 
To pufT their C4oddess to the sky ; 
Oh that their pufTs could yZ^r Her there, 
Who builds such castles in the air. 



THOUGHTS ON WHEELS. 



And in the malice of her mirth 

Lets them to simpletons on earth ! 

— Who steals the rainbow's peaceful form, 

But is the demon of the storm ; 

— Assumes a star's benignant mien, 

But wears a comet's tail unseen ; 

— Who smiles a Juno to the crowd. 

But all that win her catch a cloud, 

And, doom'd Ixion's fate to feel. 

Are whirl'd upon a giddier wheel. 

—Oh that her priests could fix her there, 

Whose breath and being are but air ! 

Yet not for this their spells they try, 

They bawl to keep her fro7n the sky, 

A harmless meteor in that sphere ; 

A baleful Ignis fatims here, 

With wandering and bewildering Hght, 

To cheer, and then confound the sight. 

Guide the lone traveller, — then betray, 

Where Death in ambush lurks for prey. 

Fierce, but familiar, at their call, 
The veriest fiend of Satan's fall ; 
— The fiend that tempted him to stake 
Heaven's bhss against the burning lake ; 
-^The fiend that tempted him again. 
To burst the darkness of his den, 
And risk whate'er of wrath untried 
Eternal justice yet could hide, 
For one transcendent chance, by sin, 
Man and his new-made world to win ; 
— That fiend, while Satan play'd his part 
At Eve's fond ear, assail'd her heart. 
And tempted her to hazard more 
Than fallen Angels lost before ; 
They ruin'd but themselves — her crime 
Brought death on all the race of time : 
— That fiend comes forth, like ^Etna's flame ; 
The SPIRIT OF GAMBLING Call his name ; 



THOUGHTS ON WHEELS. 



So flush'd and terrible in power, 

The Priests themselves he Avould devour ; 

But straight, by Act of Parliament, 

Loose through the land his plagues are sent. 

The Polypus himself divides, 

A legion issues from his sides ; 

Ten thousand shapes he wears at will, 

In every shape a devil still ; 

Eager and restless to be known 

By any mark, except his own ; 

In airy, earthly, heavenly guise, 

No matter, — if it strike the eyes ; 

Yet ever at the clink of pelf. 

He starts, and shrinks into himself: 

— A traitor now, with face of truth, 

He dupes the innocence of youth ; 

A shrewd pretender, smooth and sage, 

He tempts the avarice of age ; 

A wizard, versed in damned arts. 

He trammels uncorrupted hearts ; 

He lulls Suspicion, Sense waylays, 

Honour and Honesty betrays. 

Finds Vii'tue sleeping, and by stealth 

Beguiles her Avith a dream of wealth ; 

Till rich and poor, till fools and wise, 

Haste to the headlong sacrifice, 

Gaze till they slip into the snare ; 

— Angels might weep to see them there ; 

Then to tlie Lottery Wheels away. 

The SPIRIT OF GAMBLING drags his prey. 

Hail to the fiery bigot's rack ! 
Hail Juggernaut's destructive track ! 
Hail to the warrior's iron car ! 
But oh, be Lottery Wheels afar ! 
I'll die by torture, war, disease, 
I'll die — by any Wheels but these ! 



THOUGHTS ON WHEELS. 



NO. V. TO BRITAIN. 

I LOVE Thee, O my native Isle ! 
Dear as my mother's earliest smile ; 
Sweet as my father's voice to me 
Is all I hear, and all I see, 
When, glancing o'er thy beauteous land, 
In view thy Public Virtues stand, 
The Guardian-angels of thy coast. 
Who watch the dear domestic Host, 
The Heart'' s Affections, pleased to roam 
Around the quiet heaven of Home. 

I love Thee, — when I mark thy soil 
Flourish beneath the peasant's toil. 
And from its lap of verdure throw 
Treasures which neither Indies know. 

I love Thee, — when I hear around 
Thy looms, and wheels, and anvils sound, 
Thine engines heaving all their force. 
Thy waters labouring on their course, 
And arts, and industry, and wealth 
Exulting in the joys of health. 

I love Thee, — when I trace thy tale 
To the dim point where records fail ; 
Thy deeds of old renown inspire 
My bosom with our fathers' fire ; 
A proud inheritance I claim 
In all their sufferings, all their fame ; 
Nor less delighted, when I stray 
Down History's lengthening, widening way, 
And hail Thee in thy present hour. 
From the meridian arch of power. 
Shedding the lustre of thy reign. 
Like sunshine, over land and main. 

I love Thee, — when I read the lays 
Of British bards, in elder days. 
Till, rapt on visionary wings. 
High o'er thy cUffs my spirit sings ; 



THOUGHTS ON WHEELS. 



For I, amidst thy living choir, 
I, too, can touch, the sacred lyre. 

I love Thee, — when I contemplate 
The fuU-orb'd grandeur of thy state ; 
Thy laws and liberties, that rise, 
Man's noblest works beneath the skies. 
To which the Pyramids are tame. 
And Grecian temples bow their fame : 
These, thine immortal sages wrought 
Out of the deepest mines of thought ; 
These, on the scaffold, in the field. 
Thy warriors won, thy patriots seal'd ; 
These, at the parricidal pyre. 
Thy martyrs sanctified in fire, 
And, with the generous blood they spilt, 
Wash'd from thy soil their murderers' guilt, 
Cancell'd the curse which Vengeance sped, 
And left a blessing in its stead. 
Can words, can numbers count the price, 
Paid for this little Paradise ? 
Never, oh ! never be it lost ; 
The land is worth the price it cost. 

I love Thee, — when thy Sabbath dawns 
O'er woods and mountains, dales and lawns, 
And streams, that sparkle while they run. 
As if their fountain were the Sun: 
When, hand in hand thy tribes repair, 
Each to their chosen house of prayer. 
And all in peace and freedom call 
On Him who is the Lord of all. 

I love Thee, — when my soul can feel 
The seraph-ardours of thy zeal : 
Thy charities, to none confined, 
Bless, hke the sun, the rain, the wind; 
Thy schools the human brute shall raise, 
Guide erring youth in wisdom's ways. 
And leave, when we are turn'd to dust, 
A generation of the just. 



THOUGHTS ON WHEELS. 



I love Thee, — when I see thee stand 
The hope of every other land ; 
A sea-mark in the tide of time, 
Rearing- to heaven thy brow sublime ; 
Whence beams of Gospel-splendour shed 
A saQred halo round thine head ; 
And Gentiles from afar behold 
(Not as on Sinai's rocks of old) 
God, — from eternity conceal'd, — 
In his own light, on Thee reveal'd. 

I love Thee, — when I hear thy voice 
Bid a despairing world rejoice. 
And loud from shore to shore proclaim. 
In every tongue, Messiah's name ; 
That name, at which, from sea to sea. 
All nations yet shall bow the knee. 

I love Thee : — next to heaven above, 
Land of my fathers ! thee I love ; 
And, rail thy slanderers as they will, 
"With all thy faults I love Thee" still: 
For faults thou hast, of heinous size ; 
Repent, renounce them, ere they rise 
In judgment ; — lest thine ocean-wall 
With boundless ruin round thee fall, 
And that, which was thy mightiest stay, 
SAveep all thy rocks hke sand away. 

Yes, thou hast faults of heinous size. 
From which I turn with weeping eyes ; 
On these let them that hate Thee dvfell : 
Yet one I spare not, — one I tell. 
Tell with a whisper in thine ear ; 
Oh ! might it wring thy heart with fear ! 
Oh ! that my weakest word might roll. 
Like heaven's own thunder, through thy soul 

There is a lie in thy right hand ; 
./? bribe, corrupting all the land ; 
There is within thy gates a pest, 
— Gold and a Babylonish vest ; 



Not hid in shame-concealing shade, 

But broad against the sun display'd. 

These, — tell it not, — it must be told ; 

These from thy Lottery Wheels are sold ; 

Sold, — and thy children, train'd to sin, 

Hazard both worlds these plagues to win ; 

Nay, thy deluded statesmen stake 

Thyself, — and lose Thee for their sake ! 

' — Lose Thee ? — They shall not ; — HE, whose will 

Is Nature's law, preserves Thee still ; 

And while th' uplifted bolt impends, 

One warning more his mercy sends. 

O Britain ! O my country ! bring 
Forth from thy camp th' accursed thing ; 
Consign it to remorseless fire ; 
Watch till the latest spark expire, 
Then cast the ashes on the wind. 
Nor leave one atom-wreck behind. 

So may thy wealth and power increase ; 
So may thy people dwell in peace ; 
On Thee th' Almighty's glory rest, 
And all the world in Thee be blest. 

She^eld, Oct. 10, 1816. 



THE CLIMBING BOY'S SOLILOQUIES. 



In the summer of 1807, a local association for the purpose of "superseding the 
employment of Climbing Boys in sweeping chimneys, and bettering the condi- 
tion of those who were already so engaged," was established in Sheffield. 
Through three-and-thirty years, that object has been kept in view, though many 
and long interruptions have crippled or retarded our active exertions towards 
the desired accomplishment. But our interest in the subject, and our sympathy 
towards the infantine and juvenile victims of so unnatural a practice, have been 
periodically quickened, on every return of Easter Monday, when a good dinner 
has been given by our small Committee to all the Climbing Children of this dis- 
trict. The change,— which this attention to tlieir welfare has gradually occa- 
sioned in the personal appearance, decent behaviour, and improved intelligence 
(most of them having been Sunday scholars) of the successive generations of 
these poor creatures, which have passed before us during that period,— has been 
very creditable to their Masters and very encouraging to ourselves under the 
disheartening hinderances to our progress, in attempting otherwise to lessen the 
evils of the occupation in our own neighbourhood, and the repeated failures of 
our endeavours to obtain legislative redress for the grievance itself throughout 
the whole kingdom. 

The experience of ten years convinced us, that all efforts as well as plans ma- 
terially and permanently to benefit this class of boys must be unavailing, be- 
cause so long as the employment was authorized by the legislature, it would 
never be superseded by the introduction of mechanical apparatus : — it being the 
interest, or rather the practice, of the masters, as much as possible, to disgust 
their customers, by wilfully negligent, or slovenly mismanagement of such sub- 
stitutes when required to use them. This repugnance arose principally from a 
desire to spare themselves, and lay upon their apprentices (who were often their 
own children) the labour and torture of a villanous trade, which cannot be 
taught without cruelty, learnt without suffering, or practised without peril to 
life and limb, under the most humane master, and by the most obedient scholar. 
This fact is the unanswerable objection to the whole system,— it cannot be 
mended, though its inevitable miseries may be, and are, in numberless instances, 
frightfully aggravated. 

Wherefore, in March, 1817, we roused our townspeople to set the first exam- 
ple of moving the legislature against this sin of the nation. A public meeting 
was accordingly held, and a petition adopted, earnestly imploring the House of 
Conmions, to whom it was primarily addressed, to take the subject into early 
and serious consideration. This was presented by Lord Milton, (now Earl Fitz- 
william,) one of the representatives for Yorkshire, with a view merely of its 
being received and laid upon the table; for no expectation was entertained of 
any immediate steps being taken upon it by those to whom we appealed. 
Though temperately worded, and supported only by a few frank and plain ex- 
pressions of his own kind disposition towards the suffering children, the reading 
of this document produced so happy an impression upon the minds of the mem- 
bers present, that his Lordship, availing himself of the propitious omen, imme- 
diately moved for the appointment of a Committee to investigate the subject 
and report on the same. Meanwliile similar petitions coming in from other 
quarters, and the result of the Committee's inquiries proving highly satisfac- 
tory,— the Metropolitan Society, (instituted in 1803, for the same benevolent pur- 
poses as ours at a later period,) using their utmost zeal and diligence to promote 

3* 29 



THE CLIMBING BOy's SOLILOQUIES. 



the object,— on the 25th of June following a Bill was brought into the House of 
Commons, for prohibiting the employment of Climbing Boys in sweeping chim- 
neys, from as brief a prospective date as should be found practicable under exist- 
ing circumstances. Certain technical difficulties, however, respecting the nature 
of the Bill, and the probability of Parliament being prorogued before an Act could 
be passed, caused the i)09tponement of further proceedings till the next Session. 

In the following year, 1818, the Bill was revived, carried triumphantly through 
the Commons, sent up to the Lords, read, committed, counsel heard, evidence 
examined, favourably reported, but withdrawn before the third reading, to give 
to the government surveyors, and other professional gentlemen, opportunity to 
make certain experiments and estimates, recommended by their Lordships' 
Committee, previous to their ultimate decision on the merits of the case. 

In the third year, 1819, the Bill was again introduced in tlie House of Peers, 
when, after some very strange discussion, it was summarily thrown out. Two 
causes, exceedingly dissimilar, concurred to effect this catastrophe : namely, 
certain grave doubts, expressed by high legal authority, whether, in making 
laws, mgre tenderness were due to old chimneys or to yoong children ; — the for- 
mer being inveterately crooked and therefore incurable, whereas (though this 
was left to be inferred) the latter (the children) might easily be made crooked, 
by accommodating their pliable bodies to the perverse ways through which they 
followed their craft. The second stund)ling-block, on which indeed the neck 
of the Bill was broken, deserves more distinct exposure. A noble Earl, who re- 
sisted the Bill less by argument than by banter, among other illustrations of the 
calamities which would befall the nation, if the use of Climbing Boys were 
abolished, is reported to have said :— "I might illustrate the confined humanity 
of the supporters of this measure, by repeating a story, commonly told in Ireland. 
It was usual in that country to sweep chimneys by tying a string to the leg of a 
goose, and dragging the unfortunate bird down the chimney. This practice was 
reprobated by many humane persons, who looked upon the goose as very ill 
treated ; but an honest Irishman having asked what he should use instead of 
the goose, one of the humane gentlemen replied, ' fVhtj doii't you get a couple of 
dMcis ?'— Such was the humanity that dictated this measure, which, dwelling 
on the sufferings of the Climbing Boys, forgot every care for the safety of so- 
ciety, which, considering the few children employed in sweeping chimneys, 
threw out of its protection the many children who should be exposed to the 
hazards of fire, and to be tossed out of the windows." 

This pleasant sally put their Lordships into such good humour, that, to borrow 
a couple of the noble Earl's phrases, the Bill was either "tossed out of the win- 
dow," or " exposed to the hazard of fire," for aught that I could ever learn of its 
fate. 

The report of the foregoing debate and decision in the House of Peers was 
published in my newspaper of March 23, 1819. Under the date of Mpril the 13th 
following, I find this paragraph, written by myself, and for the authenticity of 
which I can as conscientiously vouch, as his Lordship could for the truth of "a 
story commonly told in Ireland :" — 

"Yesterday (being Easter Monday), at the Cutlers' Hall, in this town, the 
Committee for abolishing the use of Climbing Boys, and bettering the condition 
of Chimney Sweepers' Apprentices, gave their annual dinner to the children 
employed in that business here. Twenty-two were present ; and though the 
lads of this town and neighbourhood fare as well, if not better, than others in 
the like situation elsewhere, their friends here are more and more convinced, 
from experience, observation, and reflection during twelve years past, that the 
practice of employing Climbing Boys to sweep chimneys is a national crime as 
well as a national disgrace, and ought to be prohibited. 

"A boy, about thirteen years of age, who attended the dinner at the Cutlers' 
Hall, on last Easter Monday, lately came to a shocking and premature end, in 
the following manner, as we were, on this occasion, informed by his companions. 



THE CLIMBING BOy's SOLILOQUIES. 



Their master being asleep in a public house, in a village in Derbyshire, liis two 
apprentices, who Iiad been sweeping in the neighbourhood, were left with a 
company of fellows who were drinking together, and became the butts of their 
brutal conversation. Among other things, it was wantonly proposed to tlie 
younger apprentice to go up the chimney of the room in which they were sitting, 
while there was a fire in the range. He refused; but the elder, tempted by a 
promise of sixpence, ventured, and was helped up into the flue. Before he 
reached the top, however, the soot fell down in such quantities upon the fire 
below, that the chimney was soon in a blaze, and the poor boy struggled to the 
bottom through the flames, and was dragged out by the legs before he came 
direct upon the live coals in the grate. He was so miserably scorched, that he 
died, after lingering three weeks in excruciating torture." 

I need not further pursue the history of parliamentary proceedings on this 
subject, in which my friends and I bore our part from time to time, till, during 
the last Session, an Act for the total discontinuance of the evil practice passed 
both Houses, almost without a murmur of opposition, under the direct sanction 
of Her Majesty's Government. 

Among other intervening means for eventually bringing to pass this great 
purpose, Mr. Roberts projected the publication of a volume, to be entitled " The 
Chimney Siceepers' Friend, and Climbing Boys' Album," of which he persuaded 
me to undertake the editorship. The first part of the work, when completed, 
contained, in various forms, a summary of such information on the general ques- 
tion as we had been enabled to collect, during seventeen years, from the com- 
mencement of our labours and inquiries. The second part consisted of essays 
and tales, in prose and verse, illustrative of the unpitied and unalleviatgd suffer- 
ings of children, under this unnatural bondage, through more than a century 
since its introduction. These were chiefly furnished, at my solicitation, by 
living authors of distinctioru The volume was dedicated, by permission, to His 
Majesty, George IV., and being soon out of print, a new edition was issued at 
York, by a benevolent bookseller, and sold extensively through the northern 
provinces. 

The following small pieces were my quota of contributions to this work. 



October Z'i, 1810. 



PROLOGUE. A WORD WITH MYSELF. 

I KNOW they scorn the Chmbing- Boy, 
The gay, the selfish, and the proud ; 

I know his villanous employ 

Is mockery witli the thoughtless crowd. 

So be it ; — ^brand with every name 

Of burning infamy his art. 
But let his country bear the shame, 

And feel the iron at her heart. 

I cannot coldly pass him by, 

Stript, wounded, left by thieves half dead , 



THE CLIMBING BOY S SOLILOQUIES. 



Nor see an infant Lazarus lie 

At rich men's gates, imploring bread. 

A frame as sensitive as mine, 

Limbs moulded in a kindred form, 

A soul degraded yet divine, 

Endear to me my brother-worm. 

He was my equal at his birth, 

A naked, helpless, weeping child ; 

— And such are born to thrones on earth, 
On such hath every mother smiled. 

My equal he will be again, 

Down in that cold, oblivious gloom, 

Where all the prostrate ranks of men 
Crowd, without fellowship, the tomb. 

My equal in the judgment day, 

He shall stand up before the throne. 

When every veil is rent away, 
And good and evil only known. 

And is he not mine equal now ? 

Am I less fall'n from God and truth. 
Though " Wretch" be written on his brow, 

And leprosy consume his youth ? 

If holy nature yet have laws 

Binding on man, of woman born. 

In her own court I'll plead his cause, 
Arrest the doom, or share the scorn. 

Yes, let the scorn that haunts his course 
Turn on me like a trodden snake, 

And hiss and sting without remorse. 
If I the fatherless forsake. 



Shejjield, Feb. 23, 1821. 




NO. I. THE COMPLAINT. 

Who loves the Climbing Boy ? Who cares 

If well or ill I be? 
Is there a Hving soul that shares 

A thought or wish with me ? 
I've had no parents since my birth, 

Brothers and sisters none ; 
Ah ! what to me is all this earth 

Where I am only one ? 
I wake and see the morning shine, 

And all around me gay ; 
But nothing I behold is mine. 

No, not the light of day ; — 
No, not the very breath I draw ; 

These hmbs are not my own ; 
A master calls me his by law, 

My griefs are mine alone : 

Ah ! these they could not make him feel — 
Would they themselves had felt ! 

Who bound me to that man of steel 
Whom mercy cannot melt. 

Yet not for wealth or ease I sigh, 

All are not rich or great ; 
Many may be as poor as I, 

But none so desolate. 

For all I know have kin and kind. 
Some home, some hope, some joy ; 

But these I must not look to find, — 
Who knows the Climbing Boy ? 

The world has not a place of rest 

For outcast so forlorn ; 
'Twas all bespoken, all possest. 

Long before I Avas born. 
Affection, too, life's sweetest cup. 

Goes round from hand to hand, 



THE CLIMBING BOY S SOLILOQUIES. 



But I am never ask'd to sup, — 
Out of the ring I stand. 

If kindness beats within my heart, 

What heart will beat again ? 
I coax the dogs, they snarl and start ; 

Brutes are as bad as men. 

The beggar's child may rise above 

The misery of his lot ; 
The gipsy may be loved, and love ; 

But I — but I must not. 

Hard fare, cold lodgings, cruel toil. 
Youth, health, and strength consume : 

What tree could thrive in such a soil? 
What flower so scathed could bloom ? 

Should I outgrow this crippling work. 
How shall my bread be sought ? 

Must I to other lads turn Turk, 
And teach what I am taught ? 

Oh, might I roam with flocks and herds 

In fellowship along ! 
Oh, were I one among the birds. 

All wing, and life, and song ! 

Free with the fishes might I dwell 

Down in the quiet sea ! 
The snail in his cob-castle shell — 

The snail's a king to me ! 

For out he glides in April showers, 
Lies snug Avhen storms prevail ; 

He feeds on fruit, he sleeps on flowers^ 
I wish I was a snail ! 

No, never ; do the worst they can 

I may be happy still ; 
For I was born to be a man. 

And if I live I will. 



THE CLIMBING BOy's SOLILOQUIES. 



NO. II. THE DREAM. 

I DREAMT ; but what care I for dreams ? 

And yet I tremble too ; 
It look'd so like the truth, it seems 

As if it would come true. 

I dreamt that, long ere peep of day, 

I left my cold straw bed, 
And o'er a common far away, 

As if I flew, I fled. 

The tempest hurried me behind 

Like a mill-stream along ; 
I could have lean'd against the wind. 

It was so deadly strong. 

The snow — I never saw such snow — 

Raged like the sea all round, 
Tossing and tumbling to and fro ; 

I thought I must be drown'd. 

Now up, now down, with main and might 
I plunged through drift and stour ; 

Nothing, no, nothing baulk'd my flight, 
I had a giant's power. 

Till suddenly the storm stood still, 

Flat lay the snow beneath ; 
I curdled to an icicle, 

I could not stir — not breathe. 

My master found me rooted there ; 

He flogg'd me back to sense. 
Then pluck'd me up, and by the hair, 

Sheer over ditch and fence, — 

He dragg'd, and dragg'd, and dragg'd me on, 

For many and many a mile ; 
At a grand house he stopp'd anon ; 

It was a famous pile. 



THE CLIMBING BOY S SOLILOQUIES. 



Up to.the moon it seem'd to rise, 

Broad as the earth to stand ; 
The building darken'd half the skies, 

Its shadow half the land. 

All round was still — as still as death ; 

I shivering, chattering, stood ; 
And felt the coming, going breath, 

The tingling, freezing blood. 

Soon, at my master's rap, rap, rap. 

The door wide open flew ; 
In went we ; — with a thunder clap 

Again the door bang'd to. 

I trembled, as I've felt a bird 

Tremble within my fist ; 
For none I saw, and none I heard. 

But all was lone and whist. 

The moonshine through the windows shoAv'd 
Long stripes of light and gloom ; 

The carpet Avith all colours glow'd. 
Stone men stood round the room : 

Fair pictures in their golden frames, 

And looking-glasses bright ; 
Fine things, I cannot tell their names, 

Dazed and bewitch'd me quite. 

Master soon thwack' d them out my head — 

The chimney must be swept ! 
Yet in the grate the coals Avere red ; 

I stamp'd, and scream'd, and wept. 

I kneel'd, I kiss'd his feet, I pray'd ; 

For then — ^Avhich shows I dreamt — 
Methought I ne'er before had made 

The terrible attempt. 

But, as a butcher lifts the lamb 
That struofrles for its life. 



THE CLIMBING BOY S SOLILOQUIES. 



(Far from the ramping, bleating dam,) 
Beneath his desperate knife ; 

With his two iron hands he grasp'd 

And hoisted me aloof; 
His naked neck in vain I clasp'd. 

The man was pity-proof. 

So forth he swung me through the space, 

Above the smouldering jfire ; 
I never can forget his face, 

Nor his gruff growl, "Go higher." 

As if I chmb'd a steep house-side, 

Or scaled a dark draw-well. 
The horrid opening was so wide, 

I had no hold,— I fell: 

Fell on the embers, all my length, 

But scarcely felt their heat. 
When, with a madman's rage and strength, 

I started on my feet ; 

And, ere I well knew what I did, 

Had clear'd the broader vent ; 
From his wild vengeance to be hid, 

I cared not where I went. 

The passage narrow'd as I drew 

Limb after limb by force, 
Working and worming, like a screw. 

My hard, slow, up-hill cour.se. 

Rougher than harrow-teeth within, 

Sharp Hme and jagged stone 
Stripp'd my few garments, gored the skin. 

And grided to the bone. 

Gall'd, wounded, bleeding, ill at ease, 

Still I was stout at heart ; 
Head, shoulders, elbows, hands, feet, knees, 

All play'd a stirring part. 



THE CLIMBING BOY S SOLILOQUIES. 



I climb'd, and climt'd, and climb'd in vain, 

No light at top appear'd ; 
No end to darkness, toil, and pain, 

While worse and worse I fear'd. 

I cHmb'd, and climb'd, and had to climb, 

Yet more and more astray ; 
A hundred years I thought the time, 

A thousand miles the Avay. 

Strength left me, and breath fail'd at last. 

Then had I headlong dropp'd. 
But the straight funnel wedged me fast, 

So there dead-lock'd I stopp'd. 

I groan'd, I gasp'd, to shriek I tried. 
No sound came from my breast ; 

There was a weight on every side, 
As if a stone-delf press'd. 

Yet still my brain kept beating on 
Through night-mares of all shapes. 

Foul fiends, no sooner come than gone, 
Dragons, and wolves, and apes. 

They gnash'd on me with bloody jaws, 
ChatterM, and howl'd, and hiss'd : 

They clutch'd me with their cat-like claws, 
While off they whirPd in mist. 

Till, like a lamp-flame, blown away, 

My soul went out in gloom ; 
Thought ceased, and dead-alive I lay. 

Shut up in that black tomb. 

Oh, sweetly on the mother's lap 

Her pretty baby lies. 
And breathes so freely in his nap, 

She can't take ofT her eyes. 

Ah ! thinks she then, — ah, thinks she not ! 
How soon the time may be 



When all her love will be forgot, 

And he a wretch like me ? 
She in her grave at rest may lie, 

And daisies speck the sod, 
Nor see him bleed, nor hear him cry. 

Beneath a ruffian's rod. 

No mother's lap was then my bed. 

O'er me no mother smiled ; 
No mother's arm w^ent round my head, 

— Am I no mother's child ? 

Life, on a sudden, ran me through. 
Light, light, all round me blazed. 

Red flames rush'd roaring up the flue, 
— Flames by my master raised. 

I heard his voice, and ten-fold might 

Bolted through every limb ; 
I saw his face, and shot upright ; 

Brick walls made way from him. 

Swift as a squirrel seeks the bough 
Where he may turn and look 

Down on the school-boy, chop-fallen now. 
My ready flight I took. 

The fire was quickly quench'd beneath. 
Blue hght above me glanced. 

And air, sweet air, I 'gan to breathe. 
The blood within me danced. 

I climb'd, and climb'd, and climb'd away. 

Till on the top I stood. 
And saw the glorious dawn of day 

Come down on field and flood. 

Oh, me ! a moment of such joy 

I never knew before ; 
Right happy was the climbing-boy. 

One moment, — but no more. 



THE CLIMBING BOy's SOLILOQUIES. 



Sick, sick I turn'd, the world ran round, 

The stone I stood on broke, 
And plumb I toppled to the ground, 

— Like a scared owl, I woke. 

I woke, but slept again, and dream'd 

The self-same things anew : 
The storm, the snow, the building seem'd 

All true, as daylight's true. 

But, when I tumbled from the top, 

The world itself had flown ; 
There was no ground on which to drop, 

'Twas emptiness alone. 

On winter nights I've seen a star 

Leap headlong from the sky ; 
I've watch'd the lightning from afar 

Flash out of heaven and die. 

So, — but in darkness, — so I fell 

Through nothing to no place, 
Until I saw the flames of hell 

Shoot upward to my face. 

Down, down, as with a mill-stone weight, 
I plunged right through their smoke ! 

To cry for mercy 'twas too late, — 
They seized me, — I awoke : 

Woke, slept, and dream'd the hke again 
The third time, through and through. 

Except the winding up ; — ah ! then 
I wish it had been true. 

For when I cHmb'd into the air. 

Spring-breezes flapt me round ; 
Green hills, and dales, and woods were there. 

And May-flowers on the ground. 

The moon was waning in the west, 
The clouds were golden red ; 



^ 



THE CLIMBING BOY S SOLILOQUIES. 



The lark, a mile above his nest, 
Was cheering o'er my head. 

The stars had vanish'd, all but one, 

The darling of the sky, 
That glitter'd like a tiny sun, 

No bigger than my eye. 

I look'd at this, — I thought it smiled, 

Which made me feel so glad, 
That I became another child, 

And not the climbing lad : 

A child as fair as you may see, 

Whom soot has never soil'd 
As rosy-cheek' d as I might be 

If I had not been spoil'd. 

Wings, of themselves, about me grew, 

And, free as morning-light, 
Up to that single star I flew, 

So beautiful and bright. 

Through the blue heaven I stretch'd my hand 

To touch its beams, — it broke 
Like a sea-bubble on the sand ; 

Then all fell dark. — I woke. 



NO. III. EASTER-MONDAY AT SHEFFIELD. 

Yes, there are some that think of me ; 

The blessing on their heads ! I say ; 
May all their lives as happy be. 

As mine has been Avith them to-day ! 

When I was sold, from Lincolnshire 
To this good town, I heard a noise, 

What merry-making would be here 
At Easter-tide, for cHmbing boys. 



THE CLIMBING BOY S SOLILOQUIES. 



'Twas Strange, because where I had been, 
The better people cared no more 

For such as me, than had they seen 
A young crab crawling on their shore. 

Well, Easter came ; — in all the land 
Was e'er a 'prentice lad so fine ! 

A bran-new suit at second-hand, 

Cap, shoes, and stockings, all were mine. 

The coat was green, the waistcoat red. 
The breeches leather, white and clean ; 

I thought I must go off my head, 
I could have jump'd out of my skin. 

All Sunday through the streets I stroll' d, 

Fierce as a turkey-cock, to see 
How all the people, young and old. 

At least I thought so, look'd at me. 

At night, upon my truss of straw. 

Those gaudy clothes hung round the room ; 
By moon-glimpse oft their shapes I saw 

Like bits of rainbow in the gloom. 

Yet scarce I heeded them at all, 
Although I never slept a wink ; 

The feast, next day, at Cutlers' Hall, 
Of that I could not help but think. 

Wearily trail'd the night away ; " 

Between the watchman and the clock, 

I thought it never would be day ; 
At length out-crew the earliest cock. 

A second answer'd, then a third. 

At a long distance, — one, two, three, — 

A dozen more in turn were heard ; 
— I crew among the rest for glee. 



Up gat we, I and little Bill, 

And donn'd our newest and our 



THE CLIMBING BOY S SOLILOQUIES. 



Nay, let the proud say what they will, 
As grand as fiddlers we were drest. 

We left our litter in the nook, 

And wash'd ourselves as white as snow ; 
On brush and bag we scorn'd to look, 

— It was a holiday, you know. 

What ail'd me then I could not tell, 
I yawn'd the whole forenoon away, 

And hearken'd while the vicar's bell 

Went ding dong, ding dong, pay, pay, pay ! 

The clock struck twelve — I love the twelves 
Of all the hours 'twixt sun and moon ; 

For then poor lads enjoy themselves, 
— We sleep at midnight, rest at noon. 

This noon was not a resting time ! 

At the first stroke we started all, 
And, while the tune rang through the chime, 

Muster'd, like soldiers, at the hall. 

Not much like soldiei*s in our gait ; 

Yet never soldier, in his hfe. 
Tried, as he march'd, to look more straight 

Than Bill and I, — to drum and fife. 

But now I think on't, what with scars, 
Lank, bony limbs, and spavin'd feet, 

Like broken soldiers from the wars, 

We Hmp'd, yet strutted through the street. 

Then, Avhile our meagre, motley crew 
Came from all quarters of the town, 

Folks to their doors and windows flew ; 
I thought the world turn'd upside down. 

For now, instead of oaths and jeers, 

The sauce that I have found elscAvhere, 

Kind words, and smiles, and hearty cheers 
Met us, — with halfpence here and there. 



THE CLIMBING BOy's SOLILOQUIES. 



The mothers held their babies high, 
To chuckle at our hobbling- train, 

But dipt them close while we went by ; 
— I heard their kisses fall like rain, — 

And wiped my cheek, that never felt 
The sweetness of a mother's kiss ; 

For heart and eyes began to melt, 

And I was sad, yet pleased, with this. 

At Cutlers' Hall we found the crowd, 
That shout the gentry to their feast ; 

They made us '^ay, and bawl'd so loud. 
We might have been young lords at least. 

We enter'd, twenty lads and more, 
While gentlemen, and ladies too, 

All bade us welcome at the door. 

And kindly ask'd us, — " How d'ye do ?" 

" Bravely," I answer'd, but my eye 

Prickled, and leak'd, and tAvinkled still ; 

I long'd to be alone, to cry, 
— To be alone, and cry my fill. 

Our other lads were blithe and bold. 
And nestling, nodding as they sat. 

Till dinner came, their tales they told. 
And talk'd of this, and laugh'd at that. 

I pluck'd up courage, gaped, and gazed 
On the fine room, fine folks, fine things. 

Chairs, tables, knives, and forks, amazed, 
With pots and platters fit for kings. 

Roast-beef, plum-pudding, and Avhat not. 
Soon smoked before us, — such a size. 

Giants their dinners might have got ; 
We open'd all our mouths and eyes. 

Anon, upon the board, a stroke 

Wam'd each to stand up in his place ; 



THE CLIMBING BOY'S SOLILOQUIES. 



One of our generous friends then spoke 
Three or four words — they call'd it Grace. 

I think he said — " God bless our food !" 
— Oft had I heard that name, in tones 

Which ran hke ice, cold through my blood, 
And made the flesh creep on my bones. 

But now, and with a power so sweet. 

The name of God went through my heart, 

That my hps trembled to repeat 

Those words, and tears were fain to start. 

Tears, words, Avere in a twinkle gone, 

Like sparrows whirring through the street. 

When, at a sign, we all fell on. 
As geese in stubble, to our meat. 

The large plum-puddings first were carved. 
And well we younkers plied them o'er ; 

You would have thought we had been starved, 
Or were to be, — a month or more. 

Next the roast-beef flew reeking round 

In glorious slices, mark ye that ! 
The dishes were with gravy drown'd ; 

A sight to make a weasel fat. 

A great meat-pie, a good meat-pie. 

Baked in a cradle-length of tin. 
Was open'd, emptied, scoop'd so dry. 

You might have seen your face within. 

The ladies and the gentlemen 

Took here and there with us a seat ; 

They might be hungry, too, — but then 
We gave them little time to eat. 

Their arms were busy helping us. 
Like cobblers' elbows at their work, 

Or see-saw, see-saw, thus and thus ; 
A merry game at knife and fork. 



THE CLIMBING BOY S SOLILOQUIES. 



Oh then the din, the deafening din, 

Of plates, cans, crockeiy, spoons and knives, 

And waiters running- out and in ; 
We might be eating for our lives. 

Such feasting I had never seen, 

So presently had got enough ; 
The rest, like fox-hounds, stanch and keen, 

Were made of more devouring stuff. 

They cramm'd like cormorants their claAvs, 
As though they never would have done ; 

It was a feast to watch their jaws 
Grind, and grow weary, one by one. 

But there's an end to every thing ; 

And this grave dinner pass'd away, 
I wonder if great George our king 

Has such a dinner every day. 

Grace after meat again was said. 
And my good feelings sprang anew, 

But at the sight of gingerbread. 

Wine, nuts, and oranges, they flew. 

So while we took a turn with these, 

Almost forgetting we had dined ; 
As though we might do what we please, 

We ioll'd, and joked, and told our mind. 

Now I had time, if not before, 

To take a peep at every lad ; 
I counted them to twenty-four, 

Each in his Easter-finery clad. 

All wash'd and clean as clean could be, 
And yet so dingy, marr'd, and grim, 

A mole with half an eye might see 
Our craft in every look and limb. 

All shapes but straight ones you might find, 
As sapling-firs on the high moors. 



THE CLIMBING BOY S SOLILOQUIES. 



Black, stunted, crook'd, through which the wind. 
Like a wild bull, all winter roars. 

Two toddling five-year olds were there, 
Twins, that had just begun to climb. 

With cherry-cheeks, and curly hair. 
And skins not yet engrain'd with grime. 

I wish'd, I did, that they might die. 
Like " Babes i' th' Wood," the little slaves. 

And " Robin redbreast" painfully 

Hide them "with leaves," for want of graves ;- 

Rather than live, hke me, and weep 
To think that ever they were born ; 

Toil the long day, and from short sleep 
Wake to fresh miseries every morn. 

Gay as young goldfinches in spring. 
They chirp'd and peck'd, top-full of joy. 

As if it was some mighty thing 
To be a chimney-sweeper's boy. 

And so it is, on such a day 

As welcome Easter brings us here, 

— In London, too, the first of May, — 
But oh, what is it all the year ! 

Close at a Gluaker-lady's side. 

Sate a young girl ; — I know not how 

I felt when me askance she eyed. 

And a quick blush flew o'er her brow. 

For then, just then, I caught a face 

Fair, — but I oft had seen it black, 
And mark'd the owner's tottering pace 

Beneath a vile tw>bushel sack. 

Oh ! had I known ii was a lass. 

Could I have scorn'd her with her load ? 

— Next time we meet, she shall not pass 
Without a lift alono: the road. 



THE CLIMBING BOy's SOLILOQUIES. 



Her mother, — mother hut in name ! 

Brought her to-day to dine with us : 
Her father, — she's his 'prentice : — shame 

On both, to use their daughter thus ! 

Well, / shall grow, and she will grow 

Older, — it may he taller, — yet ; 
And if she'll smile on me, I know 

Poor Poll shall be poor Reuben's pet. 

Time, on his two unequal legs, 

Kept crawling round the church-clock's face, 
Though none could see him shift his pegs, 

Each was for ever changing place. 

Oh, why are pleasant hours so short ? 

And why are AA^etched ones so long ? 
They fly like swallows when we sport, 

They stand like mules when all goes wrong. 

Before Ave parted, one kind friend. 

And then another, talk'd so free ; 
They went from table-end to end. 

And spoke to each, and spoke to me. 

Books, pretty books, Avith pictures in, 
Were given to those Avho learn to read, 

Which show'd them hoAV to flee from sin. 
And to be happy boys indeed. 

These climbers go to Sunday-schools, 
And hear Avhat things to do or shun. 

Get good advice, and golden rules 
For aU their hves, — but I'm not one. 

Nathless I'll go next Sabbath day 

Where masters, Avithout thrashing, teach 

Lost children how to read, and pray. 
And sing, and hear the parsons preach. 

For I'm this day determined — not 
With bad companions to groAv old, 



But, weal or wo, whate'er my lot, 

To mind what our good friends have told. 

They told us things I never knew 

Of Him who heaven and earth did make ; 

And my heart felt their words were true, 
It burn'd within me while they spake. 

Can I forget that God is love, 

And sent his son to dwell on earth ? 

Or that our Saviour from above 
Lay in a manger at his birth, — 

Grew up in humble poverty, 
A life of grief and sorrow led ? 

No home to comfort Him had He ; 
No, not a pl^ce to lay his head. 

Yet He Avas merciful and kind, 

Heal'd with a touch all sort of harms ; 

The sick, the lame, the deaf, the blind ; 
And took young children in his arms. 

Then He was kill'd by wicked men. 
And buried in a deep stone cave ; 

But of Himself He rose again. 

On Easter-Sunday, from the grave. 

Caught up in clouds, — at God's right hand. 
In heaven He took the highest place ; 

There dying Stephen saw him stand, 
— Stephen, who had an angel's face. 

He loves the poor. He always did ; 

The little ones are still his care ; 
I'll seek Him, — let who will forbid, — 

I'll go to Him this night in prayer. 

Oh, soundly, soundly should I sleep, 
And think no more of sufferings past, 

If God Avould only bless, and keep, 
And make me his, — his own, at last. 

Sheffield, March, 1834. 



SONGS OF ZION, 



IMITATIONS OF THE PSALMS. 



Ix the following imitations of portions of the true '^ Songs of Zion," the author 
pretends not to have succeeded better than any that have gone before him ; but, 
having followed in the track of none, he would venture to hope, that, by avoid- 
ing the rugged literality of some, and the diffusive paraphrases of others, he 
may, in a few instances, have approached nearer than either of them liave 
generally done to the ideal model of what devotional poems, in a modern tongue, 
grounded upon the subjects of ancient psalms, yet suited for Christian edifica- 
tion, ought to be. Beyond this he dare not say more than that, whatever symp- 
toms of feebleness or bad taste may be betrayed in the execution of these pieces, 
he offers not to the public the premature fruits of idleness or haste. So far as 
he recollects, he has endeavoured to do his best, and, in doing so, he lias never 
hesitated to sacrifice ambitious ornament to simplicity, clearness, and force of 
thought and expression. If, in the event, it shall be found that he has added a 
little to the small national stock of "psalms and hymns, and spiritual songs," in 
which piety speaks the language of poetry, and poetry the language of inspira- 
tion, he trusts that he will be humbly contented and unfeignedly thankful. 

Sheffield, May 21, 1822. 



PSALM I. 

Thrice happy he, who shuns the way 
That leads ungodly men astray ; 
Who fears to stand where sinners meet, 
Nor with the scorner takes his seat. 

The law of God is his delight ; 
That cloud by day, that fire by night, 
Shall be his comfort in distress, 
And guide him through the wilderness. 



50 



SONGS OF ZION. 



His works shall prosper ; — he shall be 
A fruitful, fair, unwithering tree, 
That, planted where the river flows, 
Nor drought, nor frost, nor mildew knows. 

Not so the wicked ; — they are cast 
Like chaff upon the eddying blast ; 
In judgment they shall quake for dread, 
Nor with the righteous lift their head. 

For God hath spied their secret path. 
And they shall perish in his wrath ; 
He too hath mark'd his people's road, 
And brings them to his own abode. 



PSALM IIL 

The Tempter to my soul hath said, ~ 
"There is no help in God for thee :" 

Lord ! lift thou up thy servant's head. 
My glory, shield, and solace be. 

Thus to the Lord I raised my cry ; 

He heard me from his holy hill ; 
At his command the waves roU'd by ; 

He beckon'd, and the winds were still. 

I laid me doAvn and slept ; — I woke ; 

Thou, Lord ! my spirit didst sustain ; 
Bright from the east the morning broke, 

Thy comforts rose on me again. 

I will not^ear, though armed throngs 
Compass my steps, in all their wrath : 

Salvation to the Lord belongs ; 

His presence guards his people's path. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



PSALM IV.— No. 1. 

How long, ye sons of men, will ye 
The servant of the Lord despise, 

Dehght yourselves with vanity, 
And trust in refuges of lies ? 

Know that the Lord hath set apart 

The godly man in every age : 
He loves a meek and lowly heart ; 

His people are his heritage. 

Then stand in awe, nor dare to sin ; 

Commune with your own heart ; be still ; 
The Lord requireth truth within, 

The sacrifice of mind and will. 



PSALM IV.— No. 2. 

While man)?- cry, in Nature's night. 
Ah ! who will show the way to bliss ? 

Lord ! lift on us thy saving light ; 
AVe seek no other guide than this. 

Gladness thy sacred presence brings. 
More than the joyful reaper knows ; 

Or he who treads the grapes, and sings. 
While with new wine his vat o'erflows. 

In peace I lay me down to sleep ; 

Thine arm, O Lord ! shall stay my head, 
Thine angel spread his tent, and keep 

His midnight watch around my bed. 



SONGS OF ZrON. 



PSALM VIII. 

O Lord, our King ! how excellent 
Th) name on earth is known ! 

Thy gloi y in the firmament 
How wonderfully shown ! 

Yet are the humble dear to Thee ; 

Thy praises are confest 
By infants lisping on the knee, 

And sucklings at the breast. 

When I behold the heavens on high, 

The work of thy right hand ; 
The moon and stars amid the skj% 

Thy hghts in every land : — 

Lord! what is man, that thou shouldst deign 

On him to set thy love. 
Give him on earth a while to reign. 

Then fill a throne above ? 

O Lord, how excellent thy name ! 

How manifold thy ways ! 
Let Time thy saving truth proclaim, 

Eternity thy praise. 



PSALM XL 

The Lord is in his holy place. 

And from his throne on high 
He looks upon the human race 

With omnipresent eye. 

He proves the righteous, marks their path ; 

In him the weak are strong ; 
But violence provokes his wrath, 

The Lord abhorreth wrong-. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



God on the wicked will rain down 
Brimstone, and fire, and snares ; 

Tlie gloom and tempest of his frown ; 
— This portion shall be theirs. 

The righteous Lord Avill take delight 

Alone in righteousness ; 
The just are pleasing in his sight, 

The humble He will bless. 



PSALM XV. 

Lord ! who is he that shall abide 

Within thy tabernacle here ? 
Who on thy holy hill reside ? 

— He that maintains a conscience clear. 

He that in his uprightness walks, 

Who from his heart the truth will tell ; 

Of others ne'er mahgnly talks. 

Nor lets his tongue on slanders dwell: — 

He who his neighbour never wrongs. 
But, Avhile the base ones are abhorr'd. 

Pays the high honour that belongs 

To those who fear and love the Lord : — 

He that to his own hurt Avill swear, 

Nor change his word, his covenant break; 

Nor lend on usury to ensnare, 

Nor bribes to slay the righteous take : — 

He who doth these shall not be moved, 
For God will surely him uphold, 

And bring, when in the furnace tried, 
Forth from the fire, refined hke gold. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



PSALM XIX.— No. 1. 

Thy glory, Lord ! the heavens declare, 
The firmament displays thy skill ; 

The changing clouds, the viewless air. 
Tempest and calm thy word fulfil ; 

Day unto day doth utter speech, 

And night to night thy knowledge teach. 

Though voice nor sound inform the ear, 
Well known the language of their song, 

When one by one the stars appear. 
Led by the silent moon along, 

TiU round the earth, from all the sky. 

Thy beauty beams on every eye. 

Waked by thy touch, the morning sun 
Comes like a bridegroom from his bower. 

And, like a giant, glad to run 

His bright career with speed and power ; 

— Thy flaming messenger, to dart 

Life through the depth of Nature's heart. 

While these transporting visions shine 

Along the path of Providence, 
Glory eternal, joy divine. 

Thy word reveals, transcending sense ; 
—My soul thy goodness longs to see. 
Thy love to man, thy love to me. 



PSALM XIX.— No. 2. 

Thy law is perfect. Lord of light ! 

Thy testimonies sure ; 
The statutes of thy realm are right. 

And thy commandment pure. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



Holy, inviolate thy fear, 

Enduring as thy throne ; 
Thy judgments, chastening or severe, 

Justice and truth alone. 

More prized than gold, — than gold whose waste 

Refining fire expels ; 
Sweeter than honey to my taste. 

Than honey from the cells. 

Let these, O God ! my soul convert. 

And make thy servant wise ; 
Let these be gladness to my heart. 

The da3''-spring to mine eyes. 

By these may I be warn'd betimes ; 

Who knows the guile within ? 
Lord ! save me from presumptuous crimes, 

Cleanse me from secret sin ! 

So may the words my lips express, 
The thoughts that throng my mind, 

O Lord, my strength and righteousness ! 
With thee acceptance find. 



PSALM XX. 

Jehovah hear thee in the day 

Of thine adversity ; 
The God of Jacob be thy stay. 

His name thy stronghold be : — 

Help from his sanctuary send. 
Strength from his holy hill ; 

Accept thy vows, thy prayers attend, 
Tky heart's desires fulfil. 

In thy deliverance we rejoice. 
And in Jehovah's name 



SONGS OF ZION. 



Lift up our banners and our voice, 
His triumphs to proclaim. 

Now know we that the Lord will hear 

His own Anointed One, 
And rescue him from every fear ; 

— So let his will be done. 

While some in chariots put their trust, 

On horses some rely, 
Those shall be broken, these like dust 

Before the whirlwind fly. 

But we remember God alone, 
And hope in Him, whose hand 

Will raise us up though overthrown, 
Though fall'n will make us stand. 

God save the King, — the people save ! 

Lord ! hear a nation's cries : 
From death redeem us, and the grave, 

To life beyond the skies. 



PSALM XXIIL 

The Lord is my shepherd, no want shall I know ; 

I feed in green pastures, safe-folded I rest ; 
He leadeth my soul where the still waters flow, 

Restores me when wandering, redeems when opprest. 

Through the valley and shadow of death though I stray. 
Since Thou art my guardian, no evil I fear ; 

Thy rod shall defend me, thy staff be my stay, 
No harm can befall, with my Comforter near. 

In the midst of affliction my table is spread, 

With blessings unmeasured my cup runneth o'er ; 

With perfume and oil Thou anointest my head ; 
O what shall I ask of thy Providence more ? 




Let goodness and mercy, my bountiful God ! 

Still follow my steps till I meet Thee above ; 
I seek, — by the path which my forefathers trod 

Through the land of their sojourn, — thy kingdom of love. 



PSALM XXIV.— No. 1. 

The earth is thine, Jehovah ! — thine 
Its peopled realms and wealthy stores ; 

Built on the flood, by power divine, 
The waves are ramparts to the shores. 

But who shall reach thine holy place. 
Or who, O Lord ! ascend thine hill ? 

The pure in heart shall see thy face. 
The perfect man that doth thy will. 

He who to bribes hath closed his hand, 

To idols never bent the knee, 
Nor sworn in falsehood, — He shall stand 

Redeem'd, and own'd, and kept by Thee. 



PSALM XXIV.— No. 2. 

Lift up your heads, ye gates ! and wide 
Your everlasting doors display ; 

Ye angel-guards ! like flames divide, 
And give the King of Glory way. 

Who is the King of Glory ? — He, 
The Lord Omnipotent to save. 

Whose own right arm in victory 

Led captive death, and spoil'd the grave. 

Lift up your heads, ye gates ! and high 
Your everlasting portals heave ; 

Welcome the king of Glory nigh ; 

Him let the heaven of heavens receive. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



Who is the King of Glory ?— Who ? 

The Lord of Hosts ; — behold his name ; 
The kingdom, power, and honour due 

Yield Him, ye saints, with glad acclaim. 



PSALM XXIV.— No. 1. 

(the second version.) 

The earth is God's with all its stores, 
The world and all therein that be ; 

Upon the flood He fix'd the shores, 
And gave his law unto the sea. 

His holy mountain who shall climb, 
Or tread his courts without offence ? 

— He Avho hath cleansed his heart from crime, 
And wash'd his hands in innocence : — 

From vanity hath turn'd his eyes, 

Nor put to shame his neighbour's trust, 

Practised deceit, or utter'd lies ; — 
He that is upright, pure, and just. 

These shall enjoy Jehovah's grace ; 

To them his mercy shall be shown ; 
For these are they that seek thy face ; 

These, God of Jacob ! Thou Malt own. 



PSALM XXIV.— No. 2. 

(the second version.) 

Lift up your heads, ye gates ! behold 
The King of Glory draweth nigh ; 

Ye everlasting doors ! unfold 

And give Him welcome to the sky. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



Who is this King of Glory, — who ? 

— Jehovah, strong and mighty : — He 
His foes in battle overthrew, 

And crown'd Hjqiself with victory. 

Lift up your heads, ye gates ! on high ; 

Eternal doors ! throw wide your leaves ; 
Tlie King of Glory draweth nigh. 

And Him the heaven of heavens receive. 

Who is this King of Glory, — say ? 

— The Lord of Hosts, Avhom wc proclaim 
He is the King of Glory : — they 

That know his power will fear his Name. 



PSALM XXVIL— No. L 

God is my strong salvation, 

What foe have I to fear ? 
In darkness and temptation. 

My light, my help is near : 
Though hosts encamp around me, 

Firm to the fight I stand ; 
What terror can confound me, 

With God at my right hand ? 

Place on the Lord reliance, 

My soul, with courage wait ; 
His truth be thine affiance, 

When faint and desolate : 
His might thine heart shall strengthen. 

His love thy joy increase ; 
Mercy thy days shall lengthen ; 

— The Lord wiU give thee peace. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



PSALM XXVIL— No. 2. 

One thing, with all my soul's desire, 

I sought and will pursue ; 
What thine own Spirit doth inspire. 

Lord ! for thy servant do. 

Grant me within thy courts a place. 

Among thy saints a seat. 
For ever to behold thy face, 

And worship at thy feet : — 

In thy paviUon to abide, 

When storms of trouble blow. 

And in thy tabernacle hide, 
Secure from every foe. 

" Seek ye my face ;" — withoiat delay, 
When thus I hear Thee speak, 

My heart would leap for joy, and say, 
"Thy face, Lord, will I seek." 

Then leave me not when griefs assail. 
And earthly comforts flee ; 

When father, mother, kindred fail, 
My God ! remember me. 

Oft had I fainted, and resign'd 

Of every hope my hold, 
But mine afflictions brought to mind 

Thy benefits of old. 

Wait on the Lord, with courage wait ; 

My soul ! disdain to fear ; 
The righteous Judge is at the gate, 

And thy redemption near. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



PSALM XXIX. 

Give glory to God in the highest ! give praise, • 
Ye noble, ye mighty, with joyful accord ; 

All-wise are his counsels, all-perfect his ways ; 
In the beauty of holiness Avorship the Lord ! 

The voice of the Lord on the ocean is known. 
The God of eternity thundereth abroad ; 

The voice of the Lord, from the depth of his throne. 
Is terror and power ; — all nature is aw'd. 

At the voice of the Lord the cedars are bow'd. 
And towers from their base into ruin are hurl'd ; 

The voice of the Lord, from the dark-bosom'd cloud. 
Dissevers the lightning in flames o'er the world. 

See Lebanon bound, like the kid on his rocks, 
And wild as the unicorn Sirion appear : 

The Avilderness quakes Avith the resonant shocks ; 
The hinds cast their young in the travail of fear. 

The voice of the Lord through the calm of the wood 
Awakens its echoes, strikes light through its caves 

The Lord sitteth King on the turbulent flood ; 

The winds are his servants, his servants the waves. 

The Lord -is the strength of his people ; the Lord 
Gives health to his people, and peace evermore ; 

Then throng to his temple, his glory record. 
But, oh ! when he speaketh, in silence adore. 



PSALM XXX. 

Yea, I will extol Thee, 
Lord of life and light ! 

For thine arm upheld me, 
Turn'd iny foes to flight : 



SONGS OF ZION. 



I implored thy succour, 
Thou wert swift to save, 

Heal my wounded spirit, 
Bring me from the grave. 

Sing, ye saints, sing praises ! 

Call his love to mind : 
For a moment angry. 

But for ever kind : 
Grief may, like a stranger. 

Through the night sojourn, 
Yet shall joy to-morrow 

With the sun return. 

In my wealth I vaunted, 

" Naught shall move me hence ; 
Thou hadst made my mountain 

Strong in thy defence : 
— Then thy face was hidden, 

Trouble laid me low, 
"Lord," I cried, most humbly, 

" Why forsake me so ? 

" Would my blood appease Thee, 

In atonement shed ? 
Can the dust give glory, — 

Praise employ the dead ? 
Hear me, Lord ! in mercy ; 

God, my helper, hear;" 
— Long Thou didst not tarry. 

Help and health were near. 

Thou hast turn'd my mourning 

Into minstrelsy. 
Girded me with gladness. 

Set from thraldom free : 
Thee my ransom'd powers 

Henceforth shall adore, — 
Thee, my great Deliverer, 

Bless for evermore ! 



SONGS OF ZION. 



PSALM XXXIX. 

Lord ! let me knoAv mine end, 
My days, how brief their date, 

That I may timely comprehend 
How frail my best estate. 

My Hfe is but a span, 

Mine age as naught with Thee ; 
Man, in his highest honour, man 

Is dust and vanity. 

A shadow even in health, 

Disquieted with pride. 
Or rack'd with care, he heaps up wealth 

Which unknown heirs divide. 

What seek I now, O Lord ? 

My hope is in thy name ; 
Blot out my sins from thy record. 

Nor give me up to shame. 

Dumb at thy feet I lie. 

For Thou hast brought me low : 
Remove thy judgments, lest I die ; 

I faint beneath thy blow. 

At thy rebuke, the bloom 

Of man's vain beauty flies ; 
And grief shall, hke a moth, consume 

All that delights our eyes. 

Have pity on my fears, 

Hearken to my request. 
Turn not in silence from my tears, 

But give the mourner rest. 

A stranger, Lord ! with Thee, 

I walk on pilgrimage. 
Where all my fathers once, like me, 

Sojourn'd from age to age. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



O spare me yet, I pray ! 

Awhile my strength restore, 
Ere I am summon'd hence away, 

And seen on earth no more. 



PSALM XLIL— No. 1. 

As the hart, with eager looks, 
Panteth for the Avater-hrooks, 
So my soul, athirst for Thee, 
Pants the living God to see : 
When, O when, with filial fear. 
Lord ! shall I to Thee draw near ? 

Tears my food by night, by day 
Grief consumes my strength away ; 
While his craft the Tempter phes, 
" Where is now thy God ?" he cries ; 
This would sink me to despair. 
But I pour my soul in prayer. 

For in happier times I went 
Where the multitude frequent : 
I, with them, was wont to bring 
Homage to thy courts, my King ! 
I, with them, was wont to raise 
Festal hymns on holy days. 

Why art thou cast down, my soul ? 
God, thy God, shall make thee whole : 
Why art thou disquieted ? 
God shall lift thy fallen head ; 
And his countenance benign 
Be the saving health of thine. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



PSALM XLIL— No. 2. 

Hearken, Lord, to my complaints, 

For my soul within me faints ; 

Thee, far off, I call to mind, 

In the land I left behind. 

Where the streams of Jordan flow, 

Where the heights of Hermon glow. 

Tempest-tost, my failing bark 
Founders on the ocean dark ; 
Deep to deep around me calls, 
With the rush of water-falls ; 
While I plunge to lower caves, 
Overwhelm'd by all thy waves. 

Once the morning's earliest light 
Brought thy mercy to my sight, 
And my wakeful song was heard 
Later than the evening bird ; 
Hast Thou all my prayers forgot ? 
Dost Thou scorn, or hear them not ? 

Why, my soul, art thou perplex'd ? . 
Why with faithless trouble vex'd ? • 
Hope in God, whose saving name 
Thou shak joyfully proclaim. 
When his countenance shall shine 
Through the clouds that darken thine. 



PSALM XLIIL— No. 3. 
[continuation of psalm XLII.] 
Judge me. Lord, in righteousness ; 
Plead for me in my distress : 
Good and merciful Thou art, 
Bind this bleeding, broken heart : 



SONGS OF ZION. 



Cast me not despairing hence, 
Be thy love my confidence. 

Send thy light and truth to guide 
Me, too prone to turn aside. 
On thy holy hill to rest, 
In thy tabernacles blest ; 
There, to God, my chiefest joy. 
Praise shall all my powers employ. 

Why, my soul, art thou dismay'd ? 
Why of earth or hell afraid ? 
Trust in God ; — disdain to yield. 
While o'er thee He casts his shield. 
And his countenance divine 
Sheds the light of Heaven on thine. 



PSALM XLVL— No. 1. 

God is our refuge and defence. 

In trouble our unfailing aid ; 
Secure in his omnipotence. 

What foe can make our soul afraid ? 

Yea, though the earth's foundations rock. 
And mountains down the gulf be hurl'd, 

His people smile amid the shock, 

They look beyond this transient world. 

There is a river pure and bright, 

Whose streams make glad the heavenly plains ; 
Where, in eternity of light, 

The city of our God remains. 

Built by the word of his command. 

With his unclouded presence blest, 
Firm as his throne the bulwarks stand j 

There is our home, our hope, our rest. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



Thither let fervent faith aspire ; 

Our treasure and our heart be there : 
Oh for a seraph's wing of fire ! 

No, — on the mightier wings of prayer, — 

We reach at once the last retreat, 

And, ranged among the ransom'd throng. 

Fall with the Elders at his feet, 

Whose name alone inspires their song. 

Ah, soon, how soon ! our spirits droop ; 

Unwont the air of heaven to breathe : 
Yet God in very deed Avill stoop, 

And dwell Himself with men beneath. 

Come to thy living temples, then, 
As in the ancient times appear ; 

Let earth be paradise again. 

And man, O God ! thine image here. 



PSALM XLVL— No. 2. 

Come and behold the works of God, 

What desolations he will make ; 
In vengeance when He wields his rod. 
The heathen rage, their kingdoms quake 
He utters forth his voice ; — 'tis felt ; 
Like wax the world's foundations melt ; 
The Lord of Hosts is in the field, 
The God of Jacob is our shield. 

Again he maketh wars to cease. 

He breaks the bow, unpoints the spear, 
And burns the chariot ; — ^joy and peace 
In all his glorious march appear : 
Silence, O Earth ! thy Maker own ; 
Ye Gentiles, He is God alone ; 
The Lord of Hosts is in the field, 
The God of Jacob is our shield. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



PSALM XLVII. 

Extol the Lord, the Lord most high, 

King over all the earth ; 
Exalt his triumphs to the sky 

In songs of sacred mirth. 

Where'er the sea-ward rivers run, 

His banner shall advance. 
And every realm beneath the sun 

Be his inheritance. 

God is gone up with loud acclaim, 
And trumpets' tuneful voice ; 

Sing praise, sing praises to his name ; 
Sing praises, and rejoice ! 

Sing praises to our God ! sing praise 

To every creature's King ! 
His Avondrous works, his glorious ways, 

All tongues, all kindred sing. 

God sits upon his holy throne, 
God o'er the heathen reigns ; 

His truth through all the world is known, 
That truth his throne sustains. 

Princes around his footstool throng. 

Kings in the dust adore ; 
Earth and her shields to God belong : 

Sing praises evermore ! 



PSALM XLVIIL 

Jehovah is great, and great be his praise ; 

In the city of God He is King ; 
Proclaim ye his triumphs in jubilant lays, 

On the mount of his holiness sinaf. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



The joy of the earth, from her beautiful height, 

Is Zion's impregnable hill ; 
The Lord in her temple still taketh dohght, 

God reigns in her palaces still. 
At the sight of her splendour, the kings of the earth 

Grew pale with amazement and dread ; 
Fear seized them like pangs of a premature birth ; 

They came, they beheld her, and fled. 
Thou breakest the ships from the sea-circled climes, 

When the storm of thy jealousy lowers ; 
As our fathers have told of thy deeds, in their times. 

So, Lord, have we witness'd in ours. 
In the midst of thy temple, O God ! hath our mind 

Remember'd thy mercy of old ; 
Let thy name, like thy praise, to no reahii be confined 

Thy power may all nations behold. 
Let the daughters of Judah be glad for thy love, 

The mountain of Zion rejoice. 
For Thou wilt estabhsh her seat from above, 

— Wilt make her the throne of thy choice. 
Go, walk about Zion, and measure the length, 

Her walls and her bulwarks mark well ; 
Contemplate her palaces, glorious in strength, 

Her towers and their pinnacles tell. 
Then say to your children: — Our stronghold is tried ; 

This God is our God to the end ; 
His people for ever his counsels shall guide. 

His arm shall for ever defend. 



PSALM LI. 

Have mercy on me, O my God ! 

In loving-kindness hear my prayer ; 
Withdraw the terror of thy rod ; 

Lord ! in thy tender mercy, spare. 



SONGS OF ZION. 

Offences rise where'er I look ; 

But I confess their guilt to Thee : 
Blot my transgressions from thy hook, 

Cleanse me from mine iniquity. 
Whither from vengeance can I run ? 

Just are thy judgments, Lord, and right 
For all the evil I have done, 

I did it only in thy sight. 
Shapen in frailty, born in sin. 

From error how shall I depart ? 
Lo, thou requirest truth within ; 

Lord ! write thy truth upon my heart. 
Me through the blood of sprinkhng make 

Pure from defilement, white as snow; 
Heal me for my Redeemer's sake; 

Then joy and gladness I shall know. 
A perfect heart in me create, 

Renew my soul in innocence ; 
Cast not the suppliant from thy gate. 

Nor take thine Holy Spirit hence. 
Thy consolations, as of old, 

Now to my troubled mind restore ; 
By thy free Spirit's might uphold 

And guide my steps, to fall no more. 
Then sinners will I teach thy ways, 

And rebels to thy sceptre bring ; 
— Open my lips, O God ! in praise. 

So shall my mouth thy goodness sing. 
Not streaming blood, nor purging fire. 

Thy righteous anger can appease ; 
Burnt-offerings thou dost not require, 

Or gladly I would render these. 
The broken heart in sacrifice, 

Alone may thine acceptance meet ; 
My heart, O God ! do not despise. 

Broken and contrite, at thy feet. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



PSALM LXIII. 

O God ! Thou art my God alone, 
Early to Thee my soul shall cry ; 

A pilgrim in a land unknown, 

A thirsty land whose springs are dry. 

Oh that it were as it hath been, 
When, praying in the holy place, 

Thy power and glory I have seen, 

And mark'd the footsteps of thy grace ! 

Yet, through this rough and thorny maze, 
I follow hard on Thee, my God ! 

Thine hand unseen upholds my ways, 
I safely tread where Thou hast trod. 

Thee, in the watches of the night, 
When I remember on my bed. 

Thy presence makes the darkness light, 
Thy guardian wings are round my head. 

Better than hfe itself thy love, 

Dearer than all beside to me ; 
For Avhom have I in heaven above, 

Or what on earth compared with Thee ? 

Praise with my heart, my mind, my voice. 

For all thy mercy I will give ; 
My soul shall still in God rejoice. 

My tongue shall bless Thee while I Hve. 



PSALM LXIX. 

God ! be merciful to me, 
For my spirit trusts in Thee, 
And to Thee, her refuge, springs : 
Be the shadow of thy wings 



SONGS OF ZION. 



Round the trembling sinner cast, 
Till the storm is overpast. 

From the water-floods that roll 
Deep and deeper round my soul, 
Me, thine arm almighty take, 
For thy loving-kindness' sake : 
If thy truth from me depart. 
Thy rebuke would break my heart. 

Foes increase, they close me round, 
Friend nor comforter is found ; 
Sore temptations now assail, 
Hope, and strength, and courage fail ; 
Turn not from thy servant's grief. 
Hasten, Lord ! to my relief. 

Poor and sorrowful am I ; 
Set me, O my God ! on high : 
Wonders Thou for me hast wrought ; 
Nigh to death my soul is brought ; 
Save me, Lord ! in mercy save, 
Lest I sink below the grave. 



PSALM LXX. 

Hasten, Lord, to my release. 
Haste to help me, O my God ! 

Foes, hke armed bands, increase ; 
Turn them back the way they trod. 

Dark temptations round me press. 
Evil thoughts my soul assail ; 

Doubts and fears, in my distress. 
Rise, till flesh and spirit fail. 

Those that seek Thee shall rejoice ; 
I am bow'd with misery ; 



SONGS OF ZION. 



Yet I make thy law my choice ; 
Turn, my God ! and look on me. 

Thou mine only Helper art, 
My Redeemer from the grave ; 

Strength of my desiring heart, 
Do not tarry, haste to save ! 



PSALM LXXI. 

Lord ! I have put my trust in Thee, 
Turn not my confidence to shame ; 

Thy promise is a rock to me, 
A tower of refuge is thy name. 

Thou hast upheld me from the womb ; 

Thou wert my strength and hope in youth ; 
Now, trembling, bending o'er the tomb, 

I lean upon thine arm of truth. 

Though I have long outlived my peers, 
And stand amid the world alone, 

(A stranger, left by former years,) 

I know my God, — by Him am known. 

Cast me not off in mine old age, 
Forsake me not in my last hour ; 

The foe hath not foregone his rage, 
The lion ravens to devour. 

Not far, my God, not far remove : 

Sin and the world still spread their snares ; 
Stand by me now, or they Avill prove 

Too crafty yet for my gray hairs. 

Me, through what troubles hast Thou brought ! 

Me, with what consolations crown'd ! 
Now be thy last deliverance wrought ; 

My soul in peace with Thee be found ! 



SONGS OF ZION. 



PSALM LXXII. 

Hail to the Lord's anointed ! 

Great David's greater Son : 
Hail, in the time appointed, 

His reign on earth begun ! 
He comes to break oppression, 

To let the captive free ; 
To take aAvay transgression, 

And rule in equity. 
He comes, with succour speedy, 

To those who suffer wrong ; 
To help the poor and needy, 

And bid the weak be strong ; 
To give them songs for sighing, 

Their darkness turn to light. 
Whose souls, condemn'd and dying, 

Were precious in his sight. 
By such shall He be feared. 

While sun and moon endure. 
Beloved, obey'd, revered ; 

For He shall judge the poor, 
Through changing generations. 

With justice, mercy, truth, 
While stars maintain their stations, 

Or moons renew their youth. 

He shall come down, like showers 

Upon the fruitful earth, 
And love, joy, hope, like flowers, 

Spring in his path to birth ; 
Before Him, on the mountains. 

Shall Peace the herald go ; 
And righteousness in fountains 

From hill to valley flow. 
Arabia's desert-ranger. 

To Him shall bow the knee ; 



SONGS OF ZION. 



The Ethiopian stranger 

His glory come to see ; 
With offerings of devotion, 

Ships from the isles shall meet 
To pour the wealth of ocean 

In tribute at his feet. 

Kings shall fall down before Him, 

And gold and incense bring ; 
All nations shall adore Him, 

His praise all people sing ; 
For He shall have dominion 

O'er river, sea, and shore. 
Far as the eagle's pinion 

Or dove's hght wing can soar. 

For Him shall prayer unceasing, 

And daily vows ascend ; 
His kingdom still increasing, 

A kingdom without end ; 
The mountain-dews shall nourish 

A seed in weakness sown. 
Whose fruit shall spread and flourish, 

And shake like Lebanon. 

O'er every foe victorious. 

He on his throne shall rest, 
From age to age more glorious, 

All-blessing and all-blest ; 
The tide of time shall never 

His covenant remove ; 
His name shall stand for ever : 

That name to us is — Love. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



PSALM LXXIII. 

Truly the Lord is good to those, 

The pure in heart, wlio love his name ; 

But as for me, temptation rose. 

And well-nigh cast me down to shame. 

For I was envious at their state, 

When I beheld the wicked rise, 
And flourish in their pride elate, 

No fear of death before their eyes. 

Not troubled they, as others are. 

Nor plagued, with all their vain pretence ; 
Pride hke a chain of gold they wear. 

And clothe themselves with violence. 

Swoln are their eyes with wine and lust, 
For more than heart can wish have they ; 

In fraud and tyranny they trust 
To make the multitude their prey. 

Their mouth assails the heavens ; their tongue 
Walks arrogantly through the earth ; 

Pleasure's full cups to them are wrung ; 
They reel in revelry and mirth. 

" Who is the Lord, that we should fear 
Lest He our dark devices know ? 

Who the Most High, that He should hear, 
Or heed, the words of men below ?" 

Thus cry the mockers, flush'd with health, 
Exulting while their joys increase ; 

These are th' ungodly ; — men, whose wealth 
Flows like a river, ne'er to cease. 

And have I cleansed my heart in vain. 
And wash'd in innocence my hands ? 

All day afflicted, I complain, 

All night I mourn in straitening bands. 



Too painful this for me to view, 
Till to thy temple, Lord, I went, 

And. then their fearful end I knew, 
How suddenly their light is spent. 

Surely, in slippery places set, 

Down to perdition these are hurl'd ; 

Snared in the toils of their own net, 
A spectacle to all the world. 

As, from a dream when one awakes. 
The phantoms of the brain take flight ; 

So, when thy wrath in thunder breaks. 
Their image shall dissolve in night. 

Abash'd, my folly then I saw ; 

I seem'd before Thee like a brute ; 
Smit to the heart, o'erwhelm'd with awe, 

I bow'd, and worshipp'd, and was mute. 

Yet Thou art ever at my side ; 

O ! still uphold me, and defend ; 
Me by thy counsel Thou shalt guide, 

And bring to glory in the end. 

Whom have I, Lord ! in heaven but Thee ' 
On earth shall none divide my heart ; 

Then fail my flesh, my spirit flee, 
Thou mine eternal portion art. 



PSALM LXXVIL 
In time of tribulation. 

Hear, Lord ! my feeble cries ; 
With humble supplication. 

To Thee my spirit flies : 
My heart with grief is breaking. 

Scarce can my voice complain ; 
Mine eyes, with tears kept wakinj 

Still watch and weep in vain. 



SONGS OF ZION. 

The days of old, in vision, 

Bring vanish'd bliss to view ; 
The years of lost fruition 

Their joys in pangs renew : 
Remember'd songs of gladness, 

Through night's lone silence brought. 
Strike notes of deeper sadness. 

And stir desponding thought. 

Hath God cast off for ever ? 

Can time his truth impair ? 
His tender mercy, never 

Shall I presume to share ? 
Hath He his loving-kindness 

Shut up in endless wrath ? 
— No ; — this is my own blindness, 

That cannot see his path. 

I call to recollection 

The years of his right hand ; 
And, strong in his protection. 

Again through faith I stand : 
Thy deeds, O Lord ! are wonder ; 

Holy are all thy ways ; 
The secret place of thunder 

Shall utter forth thy praise. 

Thee, with the tribes assembled, 

O God ! the biUows saw ; 
They saw Thee, and they trembled, 

Turn'd, and stood still, with awe : 
The clouds shot hail — they lighten'd ; 

The earth reel'd to and fro ; 
Thy fiery piDar brighten'd 

The gulf of gloom below. 

Thy way is in great waters. 
Thy footsteps are not known ; 

Let Adam's sons and daughters 
Confide in Thee alone : 



SONGS OF ZION. 



Through the wild sea Thou leddest 
Thy chosen flock of yore ; 

Still on the waves Thou treadest, 
And thy redeem'd pass o'er. 



PSALM LXXX. 

Of old, O God ! thine own right hand 

A pleasant vine did plant and train ; 
Above the hills, o'er all the land, 

It sought the sun, and drank the rain. 
Its boughs like goodly cedars spread, 

Forth to the river went the root ; 
Perennial verdure crown'd its head, 

It bore, in every season, fruit. 

That vine is desolate and torn. 

Its scions in the dust are laid ; 
Rank o'er the ruin springs the thorn. 

The wild boar wallows in the shade. 
Lord God of Hosts ! thine ear incline, 

Change into songs thy people's fears ; 
Return, and visit this thy vine, 

Revive thy work amidst the years. 

The plenteous and continual dew 

Of thy rich blessing here descend ; 
So shall thy vine its leaf renevt^. 

Till o'er the earth its branches bend. 
Then shall it flourish wide and far. 

While realms beneath its shadow rest ; 
The morning and the evening star 

Shall mark its bounds from east to west. 

So shall thine enemies be dumb, 

Thy banish'd ones no more enslaved. 

The fulness of the Gentiles come. 
And Israel's youngest born be saved. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



PSALM LXXXIV. 

How amiable, how fair, 

O Lord of Hosts ! to me 
Thy tabernacles are ! 

My flesh cries out for Thee ; 
My heart and soul, Avith heaven-Avard fire 
To Thee, the living God, aspire. 

The sparrow here finds place 

To build her little nest ; 
The swallow's wandering- race 

Hither return and rest ; 
Beneath thy roof their young ones cry. 
And round thine altar learn to fly. 

Thrice-blessed they Avho dwell 

Within thine house, my God ! 
Where daily praises swell, 

And still the floor is trod 
By those, Avho in thy presence bow, 
By those, whose King and God art Thou. 

Through Baca's arid vale. 

As pilgrims when they pass. 
The well-springs never fail. 

Fresh rain renews the grass ; 
From strength to strength they journey still, 
Till all appear on Zion's hill. 

Lord God of Hosts ! give ear, 

A gracious answer yield ; 
O God of Jacob ! hear ; 

Behold, O God ! our shield ; 
Look on thine own Anointed One, 
And save through thy beloved Son. 

Lord ! I would rather stand 

A keeper at thy gate, 
Than on the king's right hand 

In tents of worldly state ; 



One day within thy courts, one day, 
Is worth a thousand cast away. 

God is a sun of Hght, 

Glory and grace to shed ; 
God is a shield of might. 

To guard the faithful head : 
O Lord of Hosts ! how happy He, 
The man who puts his trust in Thee ! 



PSALM XC. 

Lord ! Thou hast been thy people's rest 
Through all their generations. 

Their refuge when by danger prest. 
Their hope in tribulations ; 

Thou, ere the mountains sprang to birth, 

Or ever thou hadst form'd the earth, 
Art God from everlasting ! 

The sons of men return to clay. 
When Thou the word hast spoken, 

As with a torrent borne away, 
Gone like a dream when broken : 

A thousand years are, in thy sight, 

But as a watch amid the night, 
Or yesterday departed. 

At morn, we flourish like the grass 
With dew and sunbeams lighted, 

But ere the cool of evening pass, 
The rich array is blighted : 

Thus do thy chastisements consume 

Youth's tender leaf and beauty's bloom ; 
We fade at thy displeasure. 

Our life is like the transient breath 
That tells a mournful story ; 



Early or late, stopt short by death ; 

And where is all our glory ? 
Our days are threescore years and ten, 
And if the span be lengthen'd then. 

Their strength is toil and sorrow. 

Lo ! thou hast set before thine eyes 

All our misdeeds and errors ; 
Our secret sins from darkness rise, 

At thine awakening terrors : 
Who shall abide the trying hour ? 
Who knows the thunder of thy power ? 

We flee unto thy mercy. 

Lord ! teach us so to mark our days, 
That we may prize them duly ; 

So guide our feet in Wisdom's ways, 
That^ we may love Thee truly ; 

Return, O Lord, our griefs behold, 

And with thy goodness, as of old, 
O satisfy us early ! 

Restore our comforts as our fears, 

Our joy as our affliction ; 
Give to thy church, through changing years, 

Increasing benediction ; 
Thy glorious beauty there reveal. 
And with thy perfect image seal 

Thy servants and their labours. 



PSALM XCL 

Call Jehovah thy salvation. 

Rest beneath th' Almighty's shade ; 
In his secret habitation 

Dwell, nor ever be dismay'd : 
There no tumult can alarm thee. 

Thou shalt dread no hidden snare ; 



SONGS OF ZION. 



Guile nor violence can harm thee, 
In eternal safeguard there. 

From the sword at noon-day wasting, 

From the noisome pestilence, 
In the depth of midnight blasting, 

God shall be thy sure defence : 
Fear not thou the deadly quiver, 

When a thousand feel the blow ; 
Mercy shall thy soul deliver, 

Though ten thousand be laid low. 

Only with thine eye, the anguish 

Of the wicked thou shalt see. 
When by slow disease they languish. 

When they perish suddenly : 
Thee, though winds and waves be sweUing, 

God, thine hope, shall bear through all ; 
Plague shall not come nigh thy dwelling. 

Thee no evil shall befall. 

He shall charge his angel-legions, 

Watch and ward o'er thee to keep. 
Though thou walk through hostile legions, 

Though in desert-wilds thou sleep : 
On the lion vainly roaring. 

On his young thy foot shall tread ; 
And, the dragon's den exploring. 

Thou shalt bruise the serpent's head. 

Since, with pvtre and warm affection. 

Thou on God hast set thy love, 
With the wings of his protection 

He Avill shield thee from above : 
Thou shalt call on Him in trouble, 

He will hearken. He will save. 
Here for grief reward thee double. 

Crown with life beyond the grave. 



PSALM XCIII. 

The Lord is King-; — upon his throne 
He sits in garments glorious ; 

Or girds for war his armour on, 
In every field victorious : 

The world came forth at his command ; 

Built on his word, its pillars stand ; 
They never can be shaken. 

The Lord was King ere time began, 

His reign is everlasting ; 
When high the floods in tumult ran, 

Their foam to heaven up-casting, 
He made the raging waves his path ; 
— The sea is mighty in its wrath, 

But God on high is mightier. 

Thy testimonies. Lord ! are sure ; 

Thy realm fears no commotion. 
Firm as the earth, whose shores endure 

Th' eternal toil of ocean : 
And Thou with perfect peace wilt bless 
Thy faithful flock ; — for hohness 

Becomes thine house for ever. 



PSALM XCV. 

O COME, let us sing to the Lord, 

In God our salvation rejoice ; 
In psalms of thanksgiving record 

His praise, with one spirit, one voice ' 
For Jehovah is King, and He reigns. 

The God of all gods, on his throne ; 
The strength of the hills he maintains, 

The ends of the earth are his o\vn. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



The sea is Jehovah's ; — He made 

The tide its dominion to know ; 
The land is Jehovah's ; — He laid 

Its solid foundations below : 
Oh come, let us worship, and kneel 

Before our Creator, our God ! 
— The people who serve Him with zeal, 

— The flock whom He guides with his rod 

As Moses, the fathers of old 

Through the sea and the wilderness led. 
His wonderful works we behold. 

With manna from heaven are fed : 
To-day, let us hearken, to-day, 

To the voice that j'et speaks from above, 
And all his commandments obey, 

For all his commandments are love. 

His wrath let us fear to provoke. 

To dwell in his favour unite ; 
His service is freedom, his yoke 

Is easy, his burden is light : 
But, oh ! of rebellion beware. 

Rebellion, that hardens the breast, 
Lest God in his anger should swear 

That we shall not enter his rest. 



PSALM C. 

Be joyful in God, all ye lands of the earth ! 

Oh, serve Him with gladness and fear ! 
Exult in his presence with music and mirth, 

With love and devotion draw near. 

For Jehovah is God, — and Jehovah alone, 

Creator and ruler o'er all ; 
And we are his people, his sceptre we own ; 

His sheep, and we follow his call. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



Oh, enter his gates with thanksgiving and song, 
Your vows in his temple proclaim ; 

His praise with melodious accordance prolong. 
And bless his adorable name ! 

For good is the Lord, inexpressibly good, 
And we are the work of his hand ; 

His mercy and truth from eternity stood, 
And shall to eternity stand. 



PSALM CIIL 

O MY soul ! with all thy powers, 

Bless the Lord's most holy name ; 
O my soul ! till life's last hours. 

Bless the Lord, his praise proclaim : 
Thine infirmities He heal'd ; 
He thy peace and pardon seal'd. 

He with loving-kindness crown'd thee. 

Satisfied thy mouth with good ; 
From the snares of death unbound thee. 
Eagle-like thy youth renew'd : 
Rich in tender mercy He, 
Slow to wrath, to favour free. 

He Avill not retain displeasure. 

Though awhile He hide his face ; 
Nor his God-like bounty measure 
By our merit, but his grace : 

As the heaven the earth transcends, 
Over us his care extends. 

Far as east and west are parted. 

He our sins hath sever'd thus : 
As a father, loving-hearted, 

Spares his son. He spareth us ; 
For He knows our feeble frame, 
He remembers whence we came. 




Mark the field-flower, where it groweth, 

Frail and beautiful ; — anon, 
When the south-wind softly bloweth, 
Look again, — the flower is gone ! 
Such is man ; his honours pass, 
Like the glory of the grass. 

From eternity, enduring 

To eternity, — the Lord, 
Still his people's bliss insuring, 
Keeps his covenanted word : 

Yea, with truth and righteousness, 
Children's children He will bless. 

As in heaven, his throne and dwelling, 

King on earth he holds his sway ; 
Angels ! ye in strength excelling, 
Bless the Lord, his voice obey ; 
All his works beneath the pole. 
Bless the Lord, with thee, my soul ! 



PSALM CIV. 

My soul ! adore the Lord of might : 

With uncreated glory crown'd, 
And clad in royalty of light, 

He draws the curtain'd heavens around ; 
Dark waters his pavilion form, 
Clouds are his car, his Avheels the storm. 

Lightning before Him, and behind 
Thunder rebounding to and fro ; 
He walks upon the winged wind. 
And reins the blast, or lets it go : 

— This goodly globe his wisdom plann'd. 
He fix'd the bounds of sea and land. 




When o'er a guilty world, of old, 

He summon'd the avenging main, 
At his rebuke the billows roU'd 
Back to their parent gulf again ; 

The mountains raised their joyful heads, 
Like new creations, from their beds. 

Thenceforth the self-revolving tide 
Its daily fall and flow maintains ; 
Through winding vales fresh fountains glide, 
Leap from the hills, or course the plains ; 
There thirsty cattle throng the brink, 
And the wild asses bend to drink. 

Fed by the currents, fruitful groves 

Expand their leaves, their fragrance fling, 
Where the cool breeze at noon-tide roves, 
And birds among the branches sing ; 
Soft fall the showers when day declines. 
And sweet the peaceful rainbow shines. 

Grass through the meadows, rich with flowers, 

God's bounty spreads for herds and flocks : 
On Lebanon his cedar towers. 

The wild goats bound upon his rocks ; 
Fowls in his forests build their nests, 
— The stork amid the pine-tree rests. 

To strengthen man, condemn'd to toil. 
He fills with grain the golden ear ; 
Bids the ripe olive melt with oil. 

And swells the grape, man's heart to cheer ; 
— The moon her tide of changing knows, 
Her orb with lustre ebbs and flows. 

The sun goes down, the stars come out ; 

He maketh darkness, and 'tis night ; 
Then roam the beasts of prey about. 
The desert rings with chase and flight ; 
The lion, and the lion's brood, 
Look up, — and God provides them food. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



Morn dawTis far cast ; ere long the sun 

Warms the glad nations with his beams ; 
Day, in their dens, the spoilers shun, 
And night returns to them in dreams : 
Man from his couch to labour goes, 
Till evening bfings again repose ! 

How manifold thy Avorks, O Lord ! 

In wisdom, power, and goodness wrought ; 
The earth is with thy riches stored, 
And ocean with thy wonders fraught : 
Unfalhom'd caves beneath the deep 
For Thee their hidden treasures keep. 

There go the ships, with sails unfurl'd, 

By Thee directed on their way ; 
There, in his OAvn mysterious world, 
Leviathan delights to play ; 

And tribes that range immensity. 
Unknown to man, are known to Thee. 

By Thee alone the living live ; 

Hide but thy face, their comforts fly ; 
They gather what thy seasons give ; 

Take Thou away their breath, they die : 
Send forth thy Spirit from above, 
And all is life again, and love. 

Joy in his works Jehovah takes. 

Yet to destruction they return : 
He looks upon the earth, it quakes ; 

Touches the mountains, and they burn : 
— Thou, God ! for ever art the same ; 
I AM is thine unchanging name. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



PSALM CVIL— No. 1. 

Thank and praise Jehovah's name, 
For his mercies, firm and sure, 

From eternity the same, 
To eternity endure. 

Let the ransom'd thus rejoice, 
Gather'd out of every land ; 

As the people of his choice, 

Pluck'd from the destroyer's hand. 

In the wilderness astray. 

Hither, thither, while they roam, 
Hungry, fainting by the way. 

Far from refuge, shelter, home : — 

Then unto the Lord they cry, 
He inclines a gracious ear, 

Sends deliverance from on high. 
Rescues them from all their fear. 

To a pleasant land He brings. 
Where the vine and olive grow. 

Where from flowery hills the springs 
Through luxuriant valleys flow. 

Oh that men would praise the Lord, 
For his goodness to their race ; 

For the wonders of his word. 
And the riches of his grace ! 



PSALM CVIL— No. 2. 

They that mourn in dungeon gloom, 
Bound in iron and despair. 

Sentenced to a heavier doom 

Than the pangs they suffer there ;- 



SONGS OF ZION. 



Foes and rebels once to God, 

They disdain'd his high control ; 

Now they feel liis fiery rod 

Striking terrors through their soul. 

Wrung with agony, they fall 
To the dust, and, gazing round, 

Call for help ; — in vain they call, 
Help, nor hope, nor friend are found. 

Then unto the Lord they cry ; 

He incUnes a gracious ear. 
Sends deliverance from on high, 

Rescues them from all their fear. 

He restores their forfeit breath, 
Breaks in twain the gates of brass. 

From the bands and grasp of death. 
Forth to liberty they pass. 

Oh that men would praise the Lord, 
For his goodness to their race ; 

For the wonders of his word, 
And the riches of his grace ! 



PSALM CVIL— No. 3. 

Fools, for their transgression, see 
Sharp disease their youth consume. 

And their beauty, like a tree. 
Withering o'er an early tomb. 

Food is loathsome to their taste, 
And the eye revolts from light ; 

All their joys to ruin haste. 
As the sunset into night. 

Then unto the Lord they cry ; 
He inclines a gracious ear. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



Sends deliverance from on high, 
Rescues them from all their fear. 

He with health renews their frame, 
Lengthens out their number'd days 

Let them glorify his name 
With the sacrifice of praise. 

O that men would praise the Lord, 
For his goodness to their race ; 

For the Avonders of his word, 
And the riches of his grace. 



PSALM CVIL— No. 4. 

They that toil upon the deep, 
And, in vessels light and frail. 

O'er the mighty waters sweep 
With the billow and the gale, — 

Mark what Avonders God performs, 
When He speaks, and unconfined, 

Rush to battle all his storms 
In the chariots of the wind. 

Up to heaven their bark is whirl'd 
On the mountain of the Avave ; 

Down as suddenly 'tis hurl'd 
To th' abysses of the grave. 

To and fro they reel, they roll. 

As intoxicate with wine ; 
Terrors paralyze their soul. 

Helm they quit, and hope resign. 

Then unto the Lord they cry ; 

He incHnes a gracious ear. 
Sends deliverance from on high. 

Rescues them from all their fear. 




Calm and smooth the surges flow, 
And, where deadly lightning ran, 

God's own reconciling bow 
Metes the ocean with a span. 

O that men would praise the Lord, 
For his goodness to their race ; 

For the wonders of his word. 
And the riches of his grace. 



PSALM CVIL— No. 5. 

Let the elders praise the Lord, 
Him let all the people praise, 

When they meet with one accord 
In his courts, on holy days, 

God for sin will vengeance take. 
Smite the earth with sore distress, 

And a fruitful region make 
As the howling wilderness. 

But when mercy stays his hand. 
Famine, plague, and death depart ; 

Yea, the rock, at his command. 
Pours a river from its heart. 

There the hungry dwell in peace, 
Cities build, and plough the ground, 

While their flocks and herds increase, 
And their corn and wine abound. 

Should they yet rebel, — his arm 
Lays their pride again in dust : 

But the poor he shields from harm. 
And in Him the righteous trust. 

Whoso wisely marks his will. 
Thus evolving bliss from wo. 

Shall, redeem'd from every ill. 
All his lovinjj-kindness know. 



PSALM CXIII. 

Servants of God ! in joyful lays 
Sing- ye the Lord Jehovah's praise ; 
His glorious name let all adore, 
From age to age, for evermore. 

Blest be that name, supremely blest, 
From the sun's rising to its rest ; 
Above the heavens his power is known. 
Through all the earth his goodness shown. 

Who is like God ? — so great, so high, 
He bows Himself to view the sky, 
And yet, with condescending grace, 
Looks down upon the human race. 

He hears the uncomplaining moan 
Of those who sit and weep alone ; 
He Hfts the mourner from the dust, 
And saves the poor in him that trust. 

Servants of God ! in joyful lays 
Sing ye the Lord Jehovah's praise ; 
His saving name let all adore. 
From age to age, for evermore. 



PSALM CXVL 

I LOVE the Lord ; — He lent an ear 

When I for help implored ; 
He rescued me from all my fear ; 

Therefore I love the Lord. 

Bound hand and foot with chains of sin, 
Death dragg'd me for his prey ; 

The pit was moved to take me in ; 
All hope was far away. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



I cried, in agony of mind, 

" Lord ! I beseech Thee, save :" 

He heard me; — Death his prey resign'd, 
And Mercy shut the grave. 

Return, my soul, unto thy rest, 

From God no longer roam ; 
His hand hath bountifully blest, 

His goodness call'd thee home. 

What shall I render unto Thee, 

My Saviour in distress, 
For all thy benefits to me, 

So great and numberless ? 

This will I do, for thy love's sake, 
And thus thy power proclaim ; 

The sacramental cup I'll take, 
And call upon thy name. 

Thou God of covenanted grace, 

Hear and record m'y vow. 
While in thy courts I seek thy face. 

And at thine altar bow : — 

Henceforth to Thee myself I give ; 

With single heart and eye, 
To walk before Thee while I live, 

And bless Thee when I die. 



PSALM CXVIL 

All ye Gentiles, praise the Lord ; 

All ye lands, your voices raise : 
Heaven and earth, with loud accord, 

Praise the Lord, for ever praise ! 

For his truth and mercy stand, 
Past, and present, and to be 



SONGS OF ZION. 

Like the years of his right hand, 
Like his own eternity. 

Praise Him, ye who know his love. 
Praise Him from the depths beneath, 

Praise Him in the heights above ; 
Praise your Maker, all that breathe ! 



PSALM CXXL 

Encompass'd with ten thousand ills, 

Press'd by pursuing foes, 
I lift mine eyes unto the hills. 

From whence salvation flows. 

My help is from the Lord, Avho made 
And governs earth and sky ; 

I look to his almighty aid. 
And ever-watching eye. 

— He who thy soul in safety keeps 
Shall drive destruction hence ; 

The Lord thy keeper never sleeps ; 
The Lord is thy defence. 

The sun, Avith his afflictive light. 
Shall harm thee not by day ; 

Nor thee the moon molest by night 
Along thy tranquil way. 

Thee shall the Lord preserve from sin, 

And comfort in distress ; 
Thy going out and coming in. 

The Lord thy God shall bless. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



PSALM CXXII. 

Glad was my heart to hear , 

My old companions say, 
Come — in the house of God appear, 

For 'tis an holy day. 

Our willing feet shall stand 

Within the temple door, 
While young and old, in many a band. 

Shall throng the sacred floor. 

Thither the tribes repair, 
Where all are wont to meet. 

And, joyful in the house of prayer, 
Bend at the mercy seat. 

Pray for Jerusalem, 

The city of our God ; 
The Lord from heaven be kind to them 

That love the dear abode. 

Within these walls may peace 

And harmony be found ; 
Zion ! in all thy palaces. 

Prosperity abound ! 

For friends and brethren dear. 
Our prayer shall never cease ; 

Oft as they meet for worship here, 
God send his people peace ! 



PSALM CXXIV. 

The Lord is on our side. 
His people now may say ; 

The Lord is on our side, — or Ave 
Had fallen a sudden prey. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



Sin, Satan, Death, and Hell, 

Like fire, against us rose ; 
Then had the flames consumed us quick. 

But God repell'd our foes. 

Like Avater they return'd. 

When wildest tempests rave ; 
Then had the floods gone o'er our head, 

But God was there to save. 

From jeopardy redeem'd. 

As from the lion's wrath, 
Mercy and truth uphold our life, 

And safety guards our path. 

Our soul escaped the toils ; 

As from the fowler's snare, 
The bird, with disentangled wings, 

FHts through the boundless air. 

Our help is from the Lord ; 

In Him we will confide, 
Who stretch'd the heavens, who form'd the earth : 

— The Lord is on our side. 



PSALM CXXV. 

Who make the Lord of Hosts their tower. 

Shall Hke Mount Zion be. 
Immovable by mortal power, 

Built on eternity. 

As round about Jerusalem 

The guardian mountains stand. 

So shall the Lord encompass them 
Who hold by his right hand. 

The rod of wickedness shall ne'er 

Against the just prevail, 
Lest innocence should find a snare, 

And tempted virtue fail. 



SONGS OF ZION. 

Do good, O Lord ! do good to those 
Who cleave to Thee in heart, 

Who on thy truth alone repose, 
Nor from thy law depart. 

While rebel souls, Avho turn aside, 
Thine anger shall destroy. 

Do Thou in peace thy people guide 
To thine eternal joy. 



PSALM CXXVI. 

When God from sin's captivity 
Sets his afflicted people free, 
Lost in amaze, their mercies seem 
The transient raptures of a dream. 

But soon their ransom'd souls rejoice. 
And mirth and music swell their voice. 
Till foes confess, nor dare condemn, 
" The Lord hath done great things for them.' 

They catch the strain and answer thus, 
"The Lord hath done great things for us ; 
Whence gladness fills our hearts, and songs. 
Sweet and spontaneous, wake our tongues." 

Turn our captivity, O Lord ! 
As southern rivers, at thy word, 
Bound from their channels, and restore 
Plenty, where all was waste before. 

Who sow in tears shall reap in joy ; 
Naught shall the precious seed destroy, 
Nor long the Aveeping exiles roam. 
But bring their sheaves rejoicing home. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



PSALM CXXX. 

Out of the deptlis of wo 

To Thee, O Lord ! I cry ; 
Darkness surrounds me, but I know 

That Thou art ever nigh. 

Then hearken to my voice. 

Give ear to my complaint ; 
Thou bidst the mourning soul rejoice, 

Thou comfortest the faint. 

I cast my hope on Thee, 

Thou canst. Thou wilt forgive ; 
Wert Thou to mark iniquity, 

Who in Thy sight could live ? 

Humbly on Thee I wait, 

Confessing all my sin ; 
Lord ! I am knocking at thy gate ; 

Open, and take me in ! 

Like them, whose longing eyes 

Watch, till the morning star 
(Though late, and seen through tempests) rise, 

Heaven's portals to unbar : 

Like them I watch and pray. 

And, though it tarry long. 
Catch the first gleam of welcome day 

Then burst into a song. 

Glory to God above ! 

The waters soon will cease ; 
For, lo ! the swift returning dove 

Brings home the sign of peace. 

Though storms his face obscure. 

And dangers threaten loud, 
Jehovah's covenant is sure. 

His bow is in the cloud. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



PSALM CXXXI. 

Lord ! for ever at thy side 
Let my place and portion be ; 

Strip me of my robe of pride, 
Clothe me with humility. 

Meekly may my soul receive 
All thy Spirit hath reveal'd ; 

Thou hast spoken, — I believe, 

Though the prophecy were seal'd. 

Quiet as a weaned child, 

Weaned from the mother's breast ; 
By no subtilty beguiled. 

On thy faithful word I rest. 

Saints ! rejoicing evermore, 
In the Lord Jehovah trust ; 

Him in all his ways adore, 

Wise, and wonderful, and just. 



PSALM CXXXIL— No. 1. 

God in his temple let us meet, 

Low on our knees before Him bend ; 

Here hath He fix'd his mercy-seat. 
Here on his Sabbath we attend. 

Arise into thy resting-place, 

Thou, and thine ark of strength, O Lord 
Shine through the veil, we seek thy face ; 

Speak, for we hearken to thy word. 

With righteousness thy priests array ; 

Joyful thy chosen people be ; 
Let those who teach and those who pray. 

Let all — be holiness to Thee ! 



SONGS OF ZION. 



PSALM CXXXIL— No. 2. 

Lord ! for thy servant David's sake, 
Perform thine oath to David's Son ; — 

Thy truth Thou never wilt forsake ; — 
Look on thine own Anointed One ! 

The Lord in faithfulness hath sworn 
His throne for ever to maintain ; 

From realm to realm, the sceptre borne 
Shall stretch o'er earth Messiah's reign. 

Zion, my chosen hill of old, 

My rest, my dwelling, my delight, 

With loving-kindness I uphold. 
Her walls are ever in my sight. 

I satisfy her poor with bread, 
Her tables with abundance bless, 

Joy on her sons and daughters shed, 

And clothe her priests with righteousness. 

There David's horn shall bud and bloom. 
The branch of glory and renown ; 

His foes my vengeance shall consume ; 
Him with eternal years I crown. 



PSALM CXXXIIL 

How beautiful the sight 

Of brethren who agree 
In friendship to unite. 

And bonds of charity ! 
'Tis like the precious ointment, shed 
O'er all his robes, from Aaron's head. 

'Tis like the dews that fill 

The cups of Hermon's flowers ; 

Or Zion's fruitful hill. 

Bright with the drops of showers. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



When mingling odours breathe around, 
And glory rests on all the ground. 

For there the Lord commands 
Blessings, a boundless store, 

From his unsparing hands ; 
Yea, life for evermore ; 

Thrice happy they who meet above 

To spend eternity in love ! 



PSALM CXXXIV. 

Bless ye the Lord with solemn rite, 
In hymns extol his name, 

Ye who, within his house by night. 
Watch round the akar's flame. 

Lift up your hands amid the place 
Where burns the sacred sign. 

And pray, that thus Jehovah's face 
O'er all the earth may shine. 

From Zion, from his holy hill. 
The Lord our Maker send 

The perfect knowledge of his will, 
Salvation without end ! 



PSALM CXXXVIL 

Where Babylon's broad rivers roll. 
In exile v^e sat down to weep. 

For thoughts of Zion o'er our soul 
Came, like departed joys, in sleep. 

Whose forms to sad remembrance rise. 

Though fled for ever from our eyes. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



Our harps upon the willows hung, 

Where, worn wath toil, our limbs redined : 

The chords, untuned and trembling, rung 
With mournful music on the wind ; 

While foes, insulting o'er our wrongs, 

Cried, — " Sing us one of Zion's songs." 

How can we sing the songs we love. 
Far from our own delightful land ? 

— If I prefer thee not above 

My chiefest joy, may this right hand, 

Jerusalem ! forget its skill, 

My tongue be dumb, my pulse be still ! 



PSALM CXXXVIII. 

Thee will I praise, O Lord ! in light, 
Wjiere seraphim surround thy throne ; 

With heart and soul, with mind and might, 
Thee will I worship. Thee alone. 

I bow toward thy holy place ; 

For Thou, in mercy still the same, 
Hast magnified thy word of grace 

O'er all the wonders of thy name. 

In peril, Avhen I cried to Thee, 

How did thy strength renew my soul ! 

Kings and their realms might bend the knee, 
Could I to man reveal the whole. 

Thou, Lord ! above all height art high, 
Yet with the lowly wih Thou dwell ; 

The proud far off, thy jealous eye 
Shall mark, and with a look repel. 

Though in the depth of trouble thrown, 
With grief I shall not always strive ; 

Thou wilt thy suffering servant own. 
And Thou the contrite heart revive. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



Thy purpose then in me fulfil ; 

Forsake me not, for I am thine ; 
Perfect in me thine utmost will ; 

— Whate'er it be, that will be mine 



PSALM CXXXIX. 

Searcher of hearts ! to Thee are known 
The inmost secrets of my breast ; 

At home, abroad, in crowds, alone, 
Thou mark'st my rising and my rest, 

My thoughts far off, through every maze, 

Source, stream, and issue, — all my ways. 

No word that from my mouth proceeds, 
Evil or good, escapes thine ear ; 

Witness Thou art to all my deeds, 
Before, behind, for ever near : 

Such knowledge is for me too high ; 

I live but in my Maker's eye. 

How from thy presence should I go, 
Or whither from thy Spirit flee, 

Since all above, around, below, 
Exist in thine immensity? 

— If up to heaven I take my way, 

I meet Thee in eternal day. 

If in the grave I make my bed 

With worms and dust, lo ! Thou art there ; 
If, on the wings of morning sped, 

Beyond the ocean I repair, 
I feel thine all-cont roiling will, 
And thy right hand upholds me still. 

" Let darkness hide me," if I say, 
Darkness can no concealment be ; 




Night, on thy rising, shines hke day. 

Darkness and light are one with Thee ; 
For Thou mine embryo-form didst view 
Ere her own babe my mother knew. 

In me thy workmanship display'd, 

A miracle of power I stand ; 
Fearfully, Avonderfully made. 

And framed in secret by thy hand ; 
I lived, ere into being brought, 
Through thine eternity of thought. 

How precious are thy thoughts of peace, 
O God, to me ! how great the sum ! 

New every morn, they never cease ; 

They were, they are, and yet shall come. 

In number and in compass more 

Than ocean's sand, or ocean's shore. 

Search me, O God ! and know my heart ; 

Try me, my secret soul survey, 
And warn thy servant to depart 

From every false and evil way ; 
So shall thy truth my guidance be 
To life and immortality. 



PSALM CXLI. 

Lord ! let my prayer like incense rise. 
And when I lift my hands to Thee, 

As on the evening sacrifice, 

Look down from heaven, well-pleased, on me. 

Set Thou a watch to keep my tongue, 

Let not my heart to sin incline ; 
Save me from men who practise wrong. 

Let me not share their mirth and wine. 



108 SONGS OF ZION. 



But let the righteous, when I stray, 

Smile me in love ; — his strokes are kind ; 

His mild reproofs, like oil, allay 

The wounds they make, and heal the mind. 

Mine eyes are unto Thee, my God ! 

Behold me humbled in the dust ; 
I kiss the hand that wields the rod, 

I own thy chastisements are just. 

But oh ! redeem me from the snares 

With which the world surrounds my feet, 

— Its riches, vanities, and cares. 
Its love, its hatred, its deceit. 



PSALM CXLII. 

I CRIED unto the Lord most just. 

Most merciful in prayer ; 
I cried unto Him from the dust, 

I told Him my despair. 

When sunk my soul within me, — then 
Thou knew'st the path I chose ; 

Unharm'd I pass'd the spoiler's den, 
I walk'd through ambush'd foes. 

I look'd for friends, — there was not one 

In sorrow to condole ; 
I look'd for refuge, — there was none ; 

None cared for my soul. 

t cried unto the Lord ; — I said, — 

Thou art my refuge ; Thou, 
My portion ; — hasten to mine aid ; 

Hear and deliver noiv. 
Now, from the dungeon, from the grave, 

Exak thy suppliant's head ; 
Thy voice is freedom to the slave. 

Revival to the dead. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



PSALM CXLIII. 

Hear me, O Lord ! in my distress, 
Hear me in truth and righteousness ; 
For, at thy har of judgment tried, 
None living can be justified. 

Lord ! I have foes without, within, 
The world, the flesh, indwelling sin. 
Life's daily ills, temptation's power. 
And Satan roaring to devour. 

These, these my fainting soul surround. 
My strength is smitten to the ground ; 
Like those long dead, beneath their weight 
Crush'd is my heart and desolate. 

Yet, in the gloom of silent thought, 
I call to mind what God hath wrought, 
Thy wonders in the days of old, 
Thy mercies great and manifold. 

Ah! then to Thee I stretch my hands, 
Like failing streams through desert-sands ; 
I thirst for Thee, as harvest plains 
Parch'd by the summer thirst for rains. 

O ! let me not thus hopeless lie. 
Like one condemn'd at morn to die, 
But with the morning may I see 
Thy loving-kindness visit me. 

Teach me thy will, subdue my OAvn ; 
Thou art my God, and Thou alone ; 
By thy good Spirit guide me still, 
Safe from all foes, to Zion's hill. 

Release my soul from trouble. Lord ! 
duicken and keep me by thy word ; 
May all its promises be mine ! 
Be Thou my portion — I am thine. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



PSALM CXLV. 

The Lord is gracious to forgive, 
And sloAV to let his anger move ; 
The Lord is good to all that live, 
And all his tender mercy prove. 

Thy works, O God ! thy praise proclaim ; 
The saints thy wond'rous deeds shall sing. 
Extol thy power, and to thy name 
Homage from every nation bring. 

Glorious in majesty art Thou ; 
Thy throne for ever shall endure ; 
Angels before thy footstool bow. 
Yet dost Thou not despise the poor. 

The Lord upholdeth them that fall ; 
He raiseth men of low degree ; 
O God ! our heaUh, the eyes of all. 
Of all the Hving, wait on Thee. 

Thou openest thine exhaustless store, 
And rainest food on every land ; 
The dumb creation Thee adore, 
And eat their portion from thy hand. 

Man, most indebted, most ingrate, 
Man only, is a rebel here ; 
Teach him to know Thee, ere too late ; 
Teach him to love Thee, and to fear. 



PSALM CXLVL 

Praise ye the Lord from pole to pole ! 
Praise Thou the Lord, my soul, my soul ! 
Long as I live, my voice shall raise. 
My pulse repeat, the song of praise. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



In men, in princes, put no trust ; 
Their breath goes forth, they turn to dust ; 
Then, fleeting hke the flower of grass. 
Perish their thoughts, their glories pass. 
Thrice happy he whose heart can say 
" The God of Jacob is my slay ; 
The Lord of Hosts my help shall be, 
Who made the heaven, the earth, the sea." 
The Lord avenges the opprest. 
He sends the wandering stranger rest ; 
The Lord unbinds the prisoner's chain, 
He sets the fallen up agaip. 

The Lord restores the blind to sight, 
Gives strength to them that have no might ; 
The Lord reHeves, in their distress, 
The widow and the fatherless. 
The Lord supplies the poor with food, 
He loves to do the righteous good ; 
But for the wicked, in his wrath, 
He turns destruction on their path. 

The Lord shall reign for evermore. 
Thy King, O Zion ! — Him adore ; 
Let unborn generations raise 
To God, thy God, the song of praise ! 



PSALM CXLVIIL 
Heralds of creation ! cry, 
— Praise the Lord, the Lord most high! 
Heaven and earth ! obey the call, 
Praise the Lord, the Lord of all. 

For He spake, and forth from night 
Sprang the universe to light ; 
He commanded, — Nature heard. 
And stood fast upon his word. 



SONGS OF ZION. 



Praise Him, all ye hosts above ! 
Spirits perfected in love ; 
Sun and moon ! your voices raise, 
Sing, ye stars ! your Maker's praise. 

Earth ! from all thy depths below, 
Ocean's hallelujahs flow ; 
Lightning, vapour, wind, and storm, 
Hail and snow, his will perform. 

Vales and mountains ! burst in song ; 
Rivers ! roll with praise along ; 
Clap your hands, ye trees ! and hail 
God, who comes in every gale. 

Birds ! on Avings of rapture, soar. 
Warble at his temple-door ; 
Joyful sounds, from herds and flocks. 
Echo back, ye caves and rocks ! 

Kings ! your Sovereign serve Avith awe 
Judges ! own his righteous law ; 
Princes ! worship Him with fear ; 
Bow the knee, all people here ! 

Let his truth by babes be told, 
And his wonders by the old ; 
Youths and maidens ! in your prime. 
Learn the lays of heaven betime. 

High above all height his throne, 
Excellent his name alone ; 
Him let all his works confess ! 
Him let every being bless ! 



NARRATIVES. 



FAREWELL TO WAR: 

BEING A PROLOGUE TO 

" LORD Falkland's dream," and 

" ARNOLD DE WINKELRIED, OR THE PATRIOx's PASS- 
WORD." 

Peace to the trumpet ! — no more shall my breath 

Sound an alarm in the dull car of death, 

Nor startle to life from the truce of the tomb 

The relics of heroes, to combat till doom. 

Let Marathon sleep to the sound of the sea, 

Let Hannibal's spectre haunt CanuEe for me ; 

Let Cressy and Agincourt tremble Avith com, 

And Waterloo blush with the beauty of morn ; 

I turn not the furrow for helmets and shields, 

Nor sow dragon's teeth in their old fallow fields ; 

I Avill not, as bards have been wont, since the flood. 

With the river of song swell the river of blood, 

— The blood of the valiant, that fell in all climes, 

— The song of the gifted, that hallow'd all crimes, 

— All crimes in the war-fiend incarnate in one ; 

War, withering the earth — war, eclipsing the sun, 

Despoiling, destroying, since discord began, 

God's works and God's mercies, — man's labours and man. 

Yet war have I loved, and of war have I sung. 
With my heart in my hand and my soul on my tongue; 
With all the affections that render life dear, 
With the throbbings of hope and the flutterings of fear, 
— Of hope, that the sword of the brave might prevail, 
— Of fear, lest the arm of the righteous should fail. 

But Avhat was the war that extorted -my praise ? 
What battles were fought in my chivalrous lays ? 



NARRATIVES. 



— The war against darkness contending with light ; 

The war against violence trampling down right ; 

— The battles of patriots, with banner unfurl'd, 

To guard a child's cradle against an arm'd world ; 

Of peasants that peopled their ancestors' graves, 

Lest their ancestors' homes should be peopled by slaves. 

I served, too, in wars and campaigns of the mind ; 

My pen was the sword, which I drew for mankind ; 

— In war against tyranny throned in the West, 

— Campaigns to enfranchise the negro oppress'd ; 

In war against war, on whatever pretence, 

For glory, dominion, revenge or defence. 

While murder and perfidy, rapine and lust. 

Laid provinces desolate, cities in dust. 

Yes, war against war Avas ever my pride ; 
My youth and my manhood in waging it died. 
And age, with its weakness, its wounds, and its scars. 
Still finds my free spirit unquench'd as the stars, 
And he who would bend it to war must first bind 
The Avaves of the ocean, the wings of the wind ; 
For I call it not war, which war's counsels o'erthrows, 
I call it not war which gives nations repose ; 
'Tis judgment brought down on themselves by the proud. 
Like lightning, by fools, from an innocent cloud. 

I war against all war ; — nor, till my pulse cease, 
Will I throw down my weapons, because I love peace. 
Because I love liberty, execrate strife, 
And dread, most of all deaths, that slow death call'd life, 
Dragg'd on by a vassal, in purple or chains. 
The breath of whose nostrils, the blood in whose veins. 
He calls not his own, nor holds from his God, 
While it hangs on a king's or a sycophant's nod. 

Around the mute trumpet, — no longer to breathe 
War-clangours, my latest war-chaplets I wreathe. 
Then hang them aloof on the time-stricken oak. 
And thus, in its shadow, heaven's blessing invoke : — 



LORD FALKLAND'S DREAM. 



*' Lord God ! since the African's bondage is o'er, 
And war in our borders is heard of no more, 
May never, while Britain adores Thee, again 
The mahce of fiends or the madness of men, 
Ereak the peace of our land, and by villanous wrong 
Find a field for a hero, a hero for song." 



LORD FALKLAND'S DREAM. 

A. D. 1643. 

" lo vo gridando, Pace ! pace ! pace !" 

Petrarca, Canzone agli principi d' Italia, 

Esortazione alia Pace, A. D. 1344.* 

"In this unhappy battle (of Newbury) was slain the Lord Viscount Fall<land, 
a person of such prodigious parts of learning and knowledge, of that inimitable 
sweetness and delight of conversation, of so flowing and obliging a humanity 
and goodness to mankind, and of that primitive simpilcity and integrity of life, 
that if thorn were no other brand upon this odious and accursed war, than that 
single loss, it must be most infamous and execrable to all posterity. 
'Turpe niori, post te, solo non posse dolore.' " 

"From the entrance into that unnatural war, his natural cheerfulness and 
vivacity grew clouded; and a kind of sadness and dejection stole upon him, 
which he had never been used to. * * * After the King's return 

to Oxford, and the furious resolution of the two Houses not lo admit any treaty 
for peace, those indispositions which had before touched him grew into a perfect 
habit of uncheerfulness ; and he whi^ad been so exactly easy and afiable to all 
men, that his face and countenance was always present, and vacant to his com- 
pany, and held any cloudness or less pleasantness of the visage a kind ofrude- 
ness or incivility, became on a sudden less communicable, and thence very sad, 
pale, and exceedingly affected with the spleen. In his clothes and habit, which 
he minded before with more neatness, and industry, and expense, than is usual 
to so great a soul, he was not only incurious, but too negligent ; and in his recep- 
tion of suitors, and the necessary and casual addresses to his place, (being then 
Secretary of State to King Charles,) so quick, and sharp, and severe, that there 
wanted not some men (strangers to his nature and disposition) who believed 
him proud and imperious, from vv'hich no mortal man was ever more free." 
***** 

" When there was any overture or hope of peace he would he more erect and 
vigorous, andxjxceedingly solicitous to press any thing which he thought might 



*"I go exclaiming. Peace: peace! peace !"— From Petrarch's Canzone to 
the Princes of halij, entitled "^n Exhortation to Peace." 



NARRATIVKS. 



promote it ; and, sitting among his friends, often, after a deep silence, and fre- 
quent sighs, would, with a shrill and sad accent, ingeminate the word ' Peace ! 
peace !' and would profess that the very agony of the war, and the view of the 
calamities and desolation the kingdom did and must endure, took his sleep from 
hitn, and would shortly break his heart." 

Clakendon's History, vol. ii. part i. 

War, civil war, was raging like a flood, 

England lay weltering in her children's blood ; 

Brother Avith brother waged unnatural strife, 

Sever'd were all the charities of life : 

Two passions — virtues they assumed to be, — 

Virtues they were, — romantic loyalty. 

And stern, unyielding patriotism, possess'd 

Divided empire in the nation's breast ; 

As though two hearts might in one body reign, 

And urge conflicting streams from vein to vein. 

On either side the noblest spirits fought, 

And highest deeds on either side were wrought : 

Hampden in battle yesterday hath bled, 

Falkland to-morrow joins the immortal dead ; 

The one for freedom perish'd — not in vain ; 

The other falls — a courtier without stain. 

'Twas on the eve of Newbury's doubtful fight ; 
O'er marshall'd foes came down the peace of night, 
— ^Peace which, to eyes in living slumber seal'd. 
The mysteries of the night to come reveal'd. 
When that throng'd plain, noAf warm with heaving breath. 
Should lie in cold, fix'd apathy of death. 
Falkland from court and camp had glid away, 
With Chaucer's shade* through Speenham's woods to stray, 
And pour in solitude, without control. 
Through the dun gloom, the anguish of his soul. 
— Falkland, the plume of England's chivalry. 
The just, the brave, the generous, and the free ! 
— Nay, task not poetry to tell his praise, 
Twine but a wreath of transitory bays, 

* The estate of Speenhaniland, near Newbury, Berks, is said to have been the 
property and residence of Chaucer. 



LORD FALKLAND S DREAM. 



To crown him, as he lives, from ag-e to age. 

In Clarendon's imperishable page ; 

Look there upon the very man, and see 

What Falkland was, — what thou thyself shouldst be ; 

Patriot and loyalist, who veil'd to none. 

He loved his country and his king in one. 

And could no more, in his affections, part 

That wedded pair, than pluck out half his heart : 

Hence every wound that each the other gave. 

Brought their best servant nearer to the grave. 

Thither he hasten'd, withering in his prime, 

The worm of sorrow wrought the work of time ; 

And England's woes had sunk him with their weight, 

Had not the swifter sword foreclosed his date. 

In sighs for her his spirit was exhaled. 
He wept for her till power of weeping fail'd ; 
Pale, wasted, nerveless, absent, — he appear'd 
To haunt the scenes Avhich once his presence cheer'd ; 
As though some vampire from its cerements crept, 
And drain'd health's fountain nightly while he slept ; 
But he slept not ; — sleep from his eyelids fled. 
All restless as the ocean's foam his bed : 
The very agony of war, — the guilt 
Of blood by kindred blood in hatred spilt, 
Crush'd heart and hope ; till foundering, tempest-toss'd, 
From gulfs to deeper gulfs, himself he lost. 
Yet when he heard the drum to battle beat. 
First at the onset, latest in retreat, 
Eager to brave rebellion to the face, 
Or hunt out peril in its hiding-place, 
Falkland was slow to harm th' ignoble crowd, 
He sought to raise the fall'n, strike down the proud. 
Nor stood there one for parliament or throne 
More choice of meaner lives, more reckless of his own. 

Oft from his lips a shrill, sad moan would start, 
4nd cold misgivings creep around his heart. 
When he beheld the plague of war increase, 
And but one word found utterance — "Peace! peace! peace!" 



NARRATIVES. 



That eve he wander'd in his wayward mood, 
Through thoughts more wildering tlian the maze of wood, 
Where, when the moon-beam flitted o'er liis face, 
He seem'd th' unquiet spectre of the place : 
Rank thorns and briers, the rose and Avoodbine's bloom 
Perplex'd his path through checker'd light and gloom; 
Himself insensible of gloom or light, 
Darkness within made all around him night ; 
Till the green beauty of a httle glade. 
That open'd up to heaven, his footsteps stay'd : 
Eye, breath, and pulse, the sweet enchantment felt, 
His heart with tenderness began to melt ; 
Trembling, he lean'd against a Druid oak, 
Whose boughs bare token of the thunder-stroke. 
With root unshaken, and with bole unbroke : 
Then thus, while hope almost forgot despair, 
Breathed his soul's burden on the tranquil air : — 

" O, Britain ! Britain ! to thyself be true ; 
Land which the Roman never could subdue : 
Oft though he pass'd thy sons beneath the yoke, 
As oft thy sons the spears they bow'd to broke ; 
Others with home-wrought chains he proudly bound, 
His own too weak to fetter thee he found : 
Though garrison'd by legions, legions fail'd 
To quell thy spirit, — thy spirit again prevail'd. 
By him abandon'd, island-martyr ! doom'd 
To prove the fires of ages unconsumed. 
Though Saxon, Dane, Norwegian, Gallic hordes, 
In dire succession, gave thee laws and lords, 
Conquer'd themselves by peace, — in every field, 
The victor to the vanquish'd lost his shield. 
To win my country, to usurp her throne, 
Canute and William must forsake their own ; 
Invading rivers thus roll back the sea, 
Then lose themselves in its immensity. 

" But 'twas thine own distractions lent them aid, 
Enslaved bv strangers, because self-betray'd ; 



LORD FALKLAND S DREAM. 



Still self-distracted ;^yet should foreign foe 
Land note, another spirit thy sons would show ; 
King, nobles, parliament, and people, — all. 
Like the Red Sea's returning waves, would fall, 
And with one burst o'erwhelm the mightiest host. 
— Would such a foe this hour were on thy coast ! 

" How oft, O Albion ! since those twilight times, 
Have wars intestine laid thee waste with crimes ! 
Tweed's borderers were hereditary foes. 
Nor can one crown even now their feuds compose ; 
Thy peasantry were serfs to vassal lords, 
Yoked with their oxen, tether'd to their swords : 
Round their cross-banners kings thy bowmen ranged. 
Till York and Lancaster their roses changed. 
Those days, thank Heaven ! those evil days are past, 
Yet Avilt thou fall by suicide at last ? 
O England ! England ! from such frenzy cease. 
And on thyself have mercy, — Peace ! peace ! peace !" 

" Who talks of Peace ? — sweet Peace is in her grave : 
Save a lone widow, — from her offspring save !" 
Exclaim'd a voice, scarce earthly, in his ear. 
Withering his nerves with unaccustom'd fear ; 
His hand was on his sword, but ere he drew 
The starting blade, a suppliant cross'd his view ; 
Forth from the forest rush'd a female form. 
Like the moon's image hurrying through the storm ; 
Down in a moment at his feet, aghast, 
Lock'd to his smiling knees, herself she cast. 
Rent were her garments, and her hair unbound. 
All fleck'd with blood from many an unstaunch'd wound. 
Inflicted by the very hands that press'd. 
In rose-lipp'd infancy, her yearning breast ; 
And ever and anon she look'd behind. 
As though pursuing voices swell'd the wind ; 
Then shriek'd insanely, — "Peace is in her grave ! 
Save a lost mother, — from her children save !" 
Wan with heart-sickness, ready to expire. 
Her cheeks were ashes, but her eye was fire. 



NARRATIVKS. 



— Fire fix'd, as through the horror of the mine, 

Sparks from the diamond's still water shine ; 

So where the cloud of death o'ershadowing hung, 

Light in her eye from depth of darkness sprung, 

DazzUng his sight, and kindling such a flame 

Within his breast as nature could not name ; 

He knew her not ; — that face he never saw ; 

He loved her not, — yet love, chastised by awe 

And reverence, with mysterious terror mix'd. 

His looks on hers in fascination fix'd. [at length: 

"Who ? — whence ? — what wouldst thou?" Falkland cried 
His voice inspired h^r ; up she rose in strength, 
Gather'd her robe and spread her locks, to hide 
The unsightly wounds ; then fervently replied : — 
" Behold a matron, widow'd and forlorn. 
Yet many a noble son to me was born. 
Flowers of my youth, and morning-stars of joy ! 
— They quarrell'd, fought, and slew my youngest boy ; 
Youngest and best beloved ! — I rush'd between, 
My darling from the fratricides to screen ; 
He perish'd ; from my arms he dropp'd in death ; 
I felt him kiss my feet with his last breath ; 
The swords that smote him, flashing round my head. 
Pierced me, — the murderers saw my blood, and fled, — 
Their parent's blood ; and she, unconscious why 
She sought thee out, came here — came here to die. 
'Tis a strange tale ; — 'tis true, — and yet 'tis not ; 
Follow me, Falkland, thou shalt see the spot, — 
See my slain boy, — my life's own life, the pride 
And hope of his poor mother, — but he died ; 
He died, — and slie did not ; — how can it be ? 
But I'm immortal I — Falkland, come and see." 

She spake ; while Falkland, more and more amazed. 
On her ineffable demeanour gazed ; 
So vitally her form and features changed. 
He thought his own clear senses were deranged ; 
Outraged and desolate she seem'd no more ; 
He follow'd ; stately, she advanced before ; 



LORD FALKLAND S DREAM. 



The thickets, at her touch, gave way, and made 
A wake of moonhght through their deepest shade. 
Anon he found himself on Newbury's plain, 
Walking among the dying and the slain ; 
At every step in blood his foot was dyed. 
He heard expiring groans on every side. 
The battle-thunder had roll'd by ; the smoke 
Was vanish'd ; calm and bright the morning broke, 
While such estrangement o'er his mind was cast, 
As though another day and night had past.^ 
There, midst the nameless crowd, oft met his view 
An eye, a countenance, which Falkland knew. 



I But knew not him ; — that eye to ice congeal'd. 



That countenance by death's blank signet seal'd : 

Rebel and royalist alike laid low, 

Where friend embraced not friend, but foe grasp'd foe ; 

Falkland had tears for each, and patriot sighs, 

For both were Britons in that Briton's eyes. 

Silent before him trod the lo-fty dame. 
Breathlessly looking round her, till they came 
Where shatter'd fences mark'd a narrow road: 
Tracing that line, with prostrate corpses strow'd, 
She turn'd their faces upward, one by one, 
Till, suddenly, the newly-risen sun 
Shot through the level air a ruddy glow, 
That fell upon a visage white as snow ; 
Then with a groan of agony, so wild, 
^s if the soul within her spake,—" My child ! 
My child !" she said, and pointing, shrinking back, 
Made way for Falkland.— Prone along the track 
(A sight at once that warm'd and thrill'd with awe) 
The perfect image of himself he saw. 
Shape, feature, hmb, the arms, the dress he wore. 
And one wide, honourable wound before. 
Then flash'd the fire of pride from Falkland's eye, 
" 'Tis glorious for our country thus to die ; 
'Tis sweet to leave an everlasting name, 
A heritage of clear and virtuous fame." 



122 NARRATIVES. 

While thoughts Hke these his maddening brain possess'd, 

And lightning pulses thunder'd through his breast ; 

While Falkland living stood o'er Falkland dead, 

Fresh at his feet the corse's death-Avound bled, 

The eye met his with inexpressive glance, 

Like the sleep-walker's in benumbing trance. 

And o'er the countenance of rigid clay. 

The flush of life came quick, then pass'd away ; 

A momentary pang convulsed the chest. 

As though the heart, awaking from unrest, 

Broke with the effort ; — all again was still ; 

Chill through his tingling veins the blood ran, chill. 

"Can this," he sigh'd, "be virtuous fame and clear? 

Ah ! what a field of fratricide is here ! 

Perish who may, — 'tis England, England falls ; 

Triumph who will, — his vanquish'd country calls. 

As I have done, — as I Avill never cease. 

While I have breath and being — Peace ! peace ! peace !" 

Here stoop'd the matron o'er the dead man's face, 
Kiss'd the cold hps, then caught in her embrace 
The Hving Falkland ; — as he turn'd to speak, 
He felt his mother's tears upon his cheek : 
He knew her, own'd her, and at once forgot 
All but her earliest love, and his first lot. 
Her looks, her tones, her sweet caresses, then 
Brought infancy and fairy land again, 
— Youth in the morn and maidenhood of life. 
Ere fortune curst his father's house with strife. 
And in an age when nature's laws were changed. 
Mother and son, as heaven from earth, estranged.* 

" Oh, Falkland ! Falkland !" when her voice found 
speech. 
The lady cried ; then took a hand of each, 
And joining clasp'd them in her own, — " My son ! 
Behold thyself, for thou and he are one." 



* There had been unhappy divisions in the family, both with respect to an 
inheritance which Falkland lii'UI from his grandfather, and the religion of his 
mother, wlio was a Roman Catholic. 



LORD FALKLAND S DREAM. 



The dead man's hand grasp'd Falkland's with such force, 
He fell transform'd into that very corse, 
As though the wound which slew his counterpart 
That moment sent the death-shot through his heart. 

When from that ecstasy he oped his eyes, 
He thought his soul translated to the skies ; 
The battle-field had disappear'd ; the scene 
Had changed to beauty, silent and serene ; 
City nor country look'd as heretofore ; 
A hundred years and half a hundred more 
Had travell'd o'er him while entranced he lay ; 
England appear'd as England at this day, 
In arts, arms, commerce, enterprise, and power, 
Beyond the dreams of his devoutest hour. 
When, with prophetic call, tlie patriot brought 
Ages to come before creative thought. 

With doubt, fear, joy, he look'd above, beneath. 
Felt his own pulse, inhaled, and tried to breathe : 
Next raised an arm, advanced a foot, then broke 
Silence, yet only in a whisper spoke : — 
" My mother ! are we risen from the tomb ? 
Is this the morning of the day of doom ?" 
No answer came ; his mother was not there, 
But, tall and beautiful beyond compare, 
One, who might well have been an angel's bride. 
Were angels mortal, ghtter'd at his side. 
It seem'd some mighty wizard had unseal'd 
The book of fate, and in that hour reveal'd 
The object of a passion all his own, 
— A lady unexistent, or unknown. 
Whose saintly image, in his heart enshrined, 
Was but an emanation of his mind. 
The ideal form of glory, goodness, truth, 
Imbodied now in all the flush of youth, 
Yet not too exquisite to look upon : 
He kneel'd to kiss her hand, — the spell was gone. 
Even while his brain the dear illusion cross'd, 
Her form of soft humanitj^ was lost. 



NARRATIVES. 



— Then, nymph nor goddess, of poetic birth, 

E'er graced Jove's heaven, or stept on classic earth, 

Like her in majesty ; — the stars came down 

To wreathe her forehead with a fadeless crown ; 

The sky enrobed her with ethereal blue, 

And girt with orient clouds of many a hue ; 

The sun, enamour'd of that loveliest sight, 

So veil'd his face with her benigner light. 

That woods and mountains, valleys, rocks, and streams, 

Were only visible in her pure beams. 

While Falkland, pale and trembling with surprise, 
Admired the change, her stature seem'd to rise. 
Till from the ground, on which no shadow spread, 
To the arch'd firmament she rear'd her head ; 
And in th' horizon's infinite expanse, 
He saw the British islands at a glance, 
With intervening and encircling seas, 
O'er which, from every port, with every breeze, 
Exulting ships were sailing to all realms. 
Whence vessels came, with strangers at their helms, 
On Albion's shores all climes rejoiced to meet. 
And pour their native treasures at her feet. 

Then Falkland, in that glorious dame, descried 
Not a dead parent, nor a phantom bride. 
But her who ruled his soul, in either part. 
At once the spouse and mother of his heart, 
— His country, thus personified, in grace 
And grandeur unconceived, before his face. 
Then spake a voice, as from the primal sphere, 
f leard by his spirit rather than his ear : — 

" Henceforth let civil war for ever cease ; 
Henceforth, my sons and daughters, dwell in peace ; 
Amidst the ocean-waves that never rest, 
My lovely Isle, be thou the halcyon's nest ; 
Amidst the nations, evermore in arms, 
Be thou a haven, safe from all alarms ; 
Alone immovable 'midst ruins stand, 
Th' unfailing hope of every failing land : 



THE PATRIOT S PASS-WORD. 



To thee for refuge kings enthroned repair ; 
Slaves flock to breathe the freedom of thine air. 
Hither, from chains and yokes, let exiles bend 
Their footsteps ; here the friendless find a friend ; 
The country of mankind shall Britain be. 
The home of peace, the whole world's sanctuary." 

The pageant fled ; 'twas but a dream : he woke, 
And found himself beneath the Druid-oak, 
Where first the phantom on his vigil broke. 

Around him gleam'd the morn's reviving light ; 
But distant trumpets summon'd to the fight. 
And Falkland slept among the slain at night. 



THE PATRIOT'S PASS-WORD. 

On the achievement of Arnold de Winkelried, at the battle of Sempach, in which 
the Swiss insurgents secured the freedom of their country, against the power 
of Austria, in the fourteenth century. 

" Make way for liberty !" he cried, 
Made way for liberty, and died. 

In arms the Austrian plialanx stood, 
A living wall, a human wood ; 
A wall, — where every conscious stone 
Seem'd to its kindred thousands grown, 
A rampart all assauks to bear, 
Till time to dust their frames should wear : 
A wood, — like that enchanted grove* 
In which with fiends Rinaldo strove. 
Where every silent tree possess'd 
A spirit imprison'd in its breast, 
Which the first stroke of coming strife 
Might startle into hideous fife : 
So still, so dense, the Austrians stood, 
A living wall, a human wood. 




NARRATIVES. 



Impregnable their front appears, 
All-horrent with projected spears, 
Whose polish'd points before them shine, 
From flank to flank, one brilliant line, 
Bright as the breakers' splendours run 
Along the billows to the sun. 

Opposed to these, a hovering band 
Contended for their father-land ; 
Peasants, whose new-found strength had broke 
From manly necks th' ignoble yoke. 
And beat their fetters into swords. 
On equal terms to fight their lords. 
And what insurgent rage had gain'd, 
In many a mortal fray maintain'd. 
Marshall'd once more, at freedom's call 
They came to conquer or to fall. 
Where he who conquer'd, he who fell, 
Was deem'd a dead or hving Tell ; 
Such virtue had that patriot breathed. 
So to the soil his soul bequeathed. 
That wheresoe'er his arrows flew, 
Heroes in his own likeness grew. 
And warriors sprang from every sod 
Which his awakening footstep trod. 

And now the work of life and death 
Hung on the passing of a breath ; 
The fire of conflict burn'd within. 
The battle trembled to begin ; 
Yet Avhile the Austrians held their ground. 
Point for assault was nowhere found ; 
Where'er th' impatient Switzers gazed, 
Th' unbroken line of lances blazed; 
That line 'twere suicide to meet. 
And perish at their tyrants' feet : 
How could they rest within their graves. 
To leave their homes the haunts of slaves ? 
Would they not feel their children tread, 
With clank;ng chains, above their head ? 



THE PATRIOT'S PASS-WORD. 

It must not be ; this day, this hour 
Annihilates th' invader's power ; 
All Switzerland is in the field, 
She will not fly, she cannot yield, 
She must not fall ; her better fate 
Here gives her an immortal date. 
Few were the numbers she could boast, 
Yet every freeman was a host. 
And felt as 'twere a secret known. 
That one should turn the scale alone, 
While each unto himself was he, 
On whose sole arm hung victory. 

It did depend on one indeed ; 
Behold him, — Arnold Winkelried ; 
There sounds not to the trump of fame 
The echo of a nobler name. 
Unmark'd he stood amidst the throng. 
In rumination deep and long. 
Till you might see, with sudden grace. 
The very thought come o'er his face. 
And by the motion of his form 
Anticipate the bursting storm. 
And by th' upUfting of his brow 
Tell where the bolt would strike, and how. 

But 'twas no sooner thought than done. 
The field was in a moment Avon ; 
"Make way for liberty !" he cried, 
Then ran, with arms extended wide, 
As if his dearest friend to clasp ; 
Ten spears he swept within his grasp ; 
"Make way for liberty !" he cried. 
Their keen points cross'd from side to side ; 
He bow'd amidst them, like a tree. 
And thus made way for liberty. 

Swift to the breach his comrades fly, 
"Make way for liberty !" they cry, 
And through the Austrian phalanx dart. 
As rush'd the spears through Arnold's heart, 



NARRATIVES. 

Whilo, instantaneous as his fall, 
Rout, ruin, panic seized them all ; 
An earthqualce could not overthrow 
A city with a surer blow. 

Thus Switzerland again was free 
Thus death made way for liberty. 

Redcar, 1827. 



THE VOYAGE OF THE BLIND. 



" It was that fatal and perfidious bark, 
Built in th' eclipse, and rigg'd with curses dark." 

Milton's Lycidas. 

The subject of the following poem was sugprested by certain well-authenticated 
facts, published at Paris, in a medical journal, some years ago ; of which a few 
particulars may be given here. 

"The ship I.e Hodeitr, Captain B., of two hundred tons burden, left Havre on 
the 24th of January, 1819, fir the coast of Africa, and reached her destination 
on the 14th of March following, anchoring at Bonny, on the river Calabar. The 
crew, consisting of twenty-two men, enjoyed good health during the outward 
voyage, and during their stay at Bonny, where they continued till the 6th of 
April. They had observed no trace of ophthalmia among the natives ; and it was 
not until fifteen days after they had set sail on the return voyage, and the vessel 
was near the equator, that they perceived the first symptoms of this frighiful 
malady. It was then remarked, that the negroes, who, to the number of one 
hundred and sixty, were crowded together in the hold, and between the decks, 
had contracted a considerable redness of the eyes, which spread with singular 
rapidity. No great attention was at first paid to these symptoms, which were 
thought to be caused only by the want of air in the hold, and by the scarcity of 
water, which had already begun to be felt. At this time they were limited to 
eight ounces of water a day for each person, which (luanlity was afterwards 
reduced to the half of a wine-glass. By the advice of M. Maugiian, the surgeon 
of the ship, the negroes, who had hitherto remained shut up in the hold, were 
brought upon deck in succession, in order that they might breathe a purer air. 
But it became necessary to abandon this expedient, salutary as it was, because 
many of the negroes, alTected with nostalgia, (a passionate longing to return to 
their native land,) threw themselves into the sea, locked in each other's arms. 

"The disease which had spread itself so rapidly and frightfully among the 
Africans, soon began to infect all on board. The danger also was greatly 
increased by a malignant dysentery which prevailed at the time. The first of 
the crew who caught it was a sailor who slept under the deck near the grated 
hatch which communicated with the hold. The nc.\t day a landsman was 
seized with ophthalmia; and in three days more, the captain and the whole 
ship's company, except one sailor, who remained at the helm, were blinded by 
the disorder. 

"All means of cure which the surgeon employed, while he was able to act, 
proved ineflTectiiil. The sufferings of the crew, vvhiih were otherwise intense. 



THE VOYAGE OF THE BLIND. 



were aggravated by apprehension of revolt among the negroes, and the dread 
of not being able to reacli the West Indies, if the only sailor who had hitherto 
escaped the contagion, and on whom their whole hope rested, should lose 
his sight like the rest. This calamity had actually befallen the Leon, a Spanish 
vessel which the Rodeur met on hor passage, and the whole of whose crew, 
having become blind, were under the necessity of altogether abandoning the 
direction of their ship. These unhappy creatures, as they passed, earnestly 
entreated the charitable interference of the seamen of the Rodeur; but these, 
under their own affliction, could neither quit their vessel to go on board the 
Leon, nor receive the crew of the latter into the Rodeur, where, on account of 
the cargo of negroes, there was scarcely room for themselves. The vessels, 
therefore, soon parted company, and the Leon was never seen or heard of again, 
so far as could be traced at the publication of this narrative. In all probability, 
then, it was lost. On the fate o[ this vessel the poem is founded. 

"The Kodeur reached Guadaloupe on the 21st of June, 1819; her crew being 
in a most deplorable condition. Of the nejroes, thiily-seven had become per- 
fectly blind, twelve had lost each an eye, and fourteen remained otherwise 
blemished by the disease. Of the crew, twelve, including the surgeon, had 
entirely lost their sight; five escaped with an eye each, and four were partially 
injured." 



O'er Africa the mornino; broke, 

And many a negro-land reveal'd, 
From Europe's eye and Europe's yoke, 

In nature's inmost heart conceal'd : 
Here roll'd the Nile his glittering train. 
From Ethiopia to the main ; 
And Niger there uncoil'd his length, 
That hides his fountain and his strength. 

Among the realms of noon ; 
Casting away their robes of night, 
Forth stood in nakedness of light. 

The mountains of the moon. 



Hush'd were the bowlings of the wild. 

The leopard in his den lay prone ; 
Man, while creation round him smiled, 

Was sad or savage, man alone ; 
— Down in the dungeons of Algiers, 
The Christian captive woke in tears ; 
CafTraria's lean, marauding race 
Prowl'd forth on pillage or the chase ; 



NARRATIVES. 



— In Libyan solitude, 
Th' Arabian horseman scour'd along ; 
— The caravan's obstreperous throng, 

Their dusty march pursued. 

But wo grew frantic in the west ; 

A wily rover of the tide 
Had mark'd the hour of Afric's rest, 

To snatch her children from her side : 
At early dawn, to prospering gales, 
The eager seamen stretch their sails ; 
The anchor rises from its sleep 
Beneath the rocking of the deep ; 

Impatient from the shore, 
A vessel steals ; — she steals away. 
Mute as the lion with his prej?-, 

— A human prey she bore. 

Curst was her trade and contraband, 

Therefore that keel, by guiUy stealth. 
Fled with the darkness from the strand, 

Laden with living bales of Avealth : 
Fair to the eye her streamers play'd 
With undulating light and shade ; 
White from her prow the gurgling foam 
Flew backward tow'rds the negro's home, 

Like his unheeded sighs ; 
Sooner that melting foam shall reach 
His inland home, than yonder beach 

Again salute his eyes. 

Tongue hath not language to unfold 
The secrets of the space between 
That vessel's flanks, — whose dungeon-hold 

Hides what the sun hath never seen ; 
Three hundred writhing prisoners there 
Breathe one mephitic blast of air 
From lip to lip ; — like flame supprest. 
It bursts from every tortured breast. 



THE VOYAGE OF THE BLIND. 



With dreary groans and strong ; 
Lock'd side to side, they feel, by starts, 
The beating of each other's hearts, 

— Their breaking too, ere long. 

Light o'er the blue untroubled sea. 

Fancy might deem that vessel held 
Her voyage to eternity, 

By one unchanging breeze impell'd ; 
— Eternity is in the sky. 
Whose span of distance mocks the eye ; 
Eternity upon the main. 
The horizon there is sought in vain ; 

Eternity below 
Appears in heaven's inverted face ; 
And on, through everlasting space, 

Th' unbounded billows flow. 

Yet, while his wandering bark career'd. 

The master knew, Avith stern delight. 
That full for port her helm was steer'd, 

With aim unerring, day and night. 
— Pirate ! that port thou ne'er shalt hail ; 
Thine eye in search of it shall fail : 
But, lo ! thy slaves expire beneath ; 
Haste, bring the wretches forth to breathe 

Brought forth, — away they spring. 
And headlong in the whelming tide. 
Rescued from thee, their sorrows hide 

Beneath the halcyon's wing. 



There came an angel of eclipse. 

Who haunts at times th' Atlantic flood. 

And smites with blindness, on their ships, 
The captives and the men of blood. 

— Here, in the hold the blight began, 

From eye to eye contagion ran ; 



NARRATIVES. 



Sight, as with burning brands, was quench'd ; 
None from the fiery trial blench'd, 

But, panting for release, 
They call'd oa death, who, close behind, 
Brought pestilence to lead the blind, 

From agony to peace. 

The two-fold plague no power coutd check : 

Unseen its withering arrovvs flew ; 
It walk'd in silence on the deck, 

And smote from stem to stern the crew : 
— As glow-worms dwindle in the shade, 
As lamps in charnel-houses fade, 
From every orb, with vision fired, 
In flitting sparks the light retired ; 

The sufferers saw it go. 
And o'er the ship, the sea, the skies, 
Pursued it with their faihng eyes, 

Till all was black below. 

A murmur swell'd along the gale, 

All rose, and held their breath to hear ; 
All look'd, but none could spy a sail. 

Although a sail Avas near ; 
— " Help ! help !" our beckoning sailors cried 
" Help ! help !" a hundred tongues replied : 
Then hideous clamour rent the air, 
Questions and answers of despair : 

Few words the mystery clear'd ; 
The pest had found that second bark. 
Where every eye but his was dark. 

Whose hand the vessel steer'd. 

He, wild with panic, turn'd away, 

And thence his shrieking comrades bore ; 

From either ship the winds convey 

Farewells, that soon are heard no more : 

— A calm of horror hush'd the vv-aves ; 

Behold them ! — merchant, seamen, slaves, 



THE VOYAGE OF THE BLIND. 



The blind, the dying, and the dead ; 
All help, all hope, for ever fled ; 

Unseen, yet face to face ! 
Wo past, wo present, wo to come. 
Held for a while each victim dumb, 

— Impaled upon his place. 

It is not in the blood of man 

To crouch ingloriously to fate ; 
Nature will struggle while she can ; 

Misfortune makes her children great ; 
The head which lightning hath laid low. 
Is hallow'd by the noble blow : 
The wretch who yields a felon's breath. 
Emerges from the cloud of death, 

A spirit on the storm : 
But virtue perishing unknown, 
Watch'd by the eye of Heaven alone, 

Is earth's least earthly form. 

What were the scenes on board that bark ? 

The tragedy which none beheld, 
When (as the deluge bore the ark), 

By power invisible impell'd. 
The keel went blindfold through the surge, 
Where stream might drift, or tempest urge ; 
— Plague, famine, thirst, their numbers slew, 
And frenzy seized the hardier few 

Who yet were spared to try 
How everlasting are the pangs. 
When life upon a moment hangs, 

And death stands mocking by. 

Imagination's daring glance 

May pierce that vale of mystery. 

As in the rapture of a trance. 

Things which no eye hath seen to see ; 

And hear by fits along the gales. 

Screams, maniac-laughter, hollow wails : 



NARRATIVES. 



— They stand, they He, above, beneath, 
Groans of unpitied anguish breathe, 

Tears unavaihng shed ; 
Each, in abstraction of despair, 
Seems to himself a hermit there, 

Alive among the dead. 

Yet respite, — respite from his woes, 

Even here, the conscious sufferer feels ; 
Worn down by torture to repose, 

Slumber the vanish' d world reveals : 
— Ah ! then the eyes, extinct in night. 
Again behold the blessed light ; 
Ah ! then the frame of rack'd disease 
Lays its delighted limbs at ease ; 

Swift to his own dear land, 
The unfetter'd slave with shouts returns, 
Hard by his dreaming tyrant burns 

At sight of Cuba's strand. 

To blank reality they wake, 

In darkness opens every eye : 
Peace comes ; — the negro's heart-strings break, 

To him 'tis more than life to die : 
— How feels, how fares the man of blood ? 
In endless exile on the flood, 
Rapt, as though fiends his vessel steer'd. 
Things which he once believed and fear'd, 

— Then scorn'd as idle names, — 
Death, judgment, conscience, hell conspire, 
With thronging images of fire. 

To light up guilt in flames. 

Who cried for mercy in that hour, 

And found it on the desert sea ? 
Who to the utmost grasp of power 

Wrestled with life's last enemy ? 
Who, Marius-like, defying fate, 
(Marius on fallen Carthage) sate ? 



THE VOYAGE OF THE BLIND. 



Who, through a hurricane of fears, 
Clung to the hopes of future years ? 

And who, with heart unquail'd, 
Look'd from time's trembhng precipice 
Down on eternity's abyss, 

Till breath and footing fail'd ? 

Is there among this crew not one. 

One whom a widow'd mother bare, — 
Who mourns far off her only son, 

And pours for him her soul in prayer ? 
Even notv, when o'er his soften'd thought, 
Remembrance of her love is brought, 
To soothe death's agony, and dart 
A throb of comfort through his heart, — 

Even now a mystic knell 
Sounds through her pulse ; — she hfts her eye. 
Sees a pale spirit passing by, 

And hears his voice, " farewell !" 

Mother and son shall meet no more : 

— The floating tomb of its own dead. 
That ship shall never reach a shore ; 

But, far from track of seamen led, 
The sun shall watch it, day by day. 
Careering on its lonely way ; 
Month after month, the moon shine pale 
On falling mast and riven sail ; 

The stars, from year to year, 
Mark the bulged flanks, and sunken deck. 
Till not a ruin of the wreck 

On ocean's face appear. 



NARRATIVES. 



AN E VERY-DAY TALE. 

Written for a benevolent Society in tlie metropolis, the object of which is to 
relieve poor women (luring the first month of their widowhood-, to preserve what 
little property they may have from wreck and ruin, in a season of embarrass- 
ment, when kindness and good counsel are especially needed ; and, so far as 
may be practicable, to assist the destitute with future means of maintaining 
themselves and their fatheilcss children. 

" The short and simple annals of the poor." — Gray. 

Mine is a tale of every day, 

Yet turn not thou thine ear away ; 

For 'tis the litterest thought of all, 

The worm-wood added to the gall, 

That such a wreck of mortal bliss, 

That such a weight of avo as this, 

Is no strange thing, — but, strange to say ! 

The tale, the truth of every day. 

At Mary's birth, her mother smiled 
Upon her first, last, only child, 
And, at the sight of that young flower, 
Forgot the anguish of her hour ; 
Her pains return'd ; — she soon forgot 
Love, joy, hope, sorrow, — she was not. 

Her partner stood, like one bereft 
Of all, — not all, their babe was left ; 
By the dead mother's side it slept. 
Slept sweetly ; — when it woke, it wept. 
" Live, Mary, live, and I will be 
Father and mother both to thee !" 
The mourner cried, and while he spake. 
His breaking heart forebore to break ; 
Faith, courage, patience, from above. 
Flew to the help of fainting love. 
While o'er his charge that parent yearn'd. 
All woman's tenderness he learn'd, 
All woman's waking, sleeping care, 
— That sleeps not to her babe, — her prayer. 



AN EVERY-DAY TALE. 



Of power to bring upon its head, 

The richest blessings heaven can shed ; 

All these he learn'd, and Uved to say, 

" My strength was given me as my day." 

So the Red Indian of those woods, 
That echo to Lake Erie's floods, 
Reft of his consort in the wild, 
Became the mother of his child ! 
Nature (herself a mother) saw 
His grief, and loosed her kindhest law : 
Warm from its fount life's stream, propell'd, 
His breasts with sweet nutrition swell'd. 
At whose strange springs, his infant drew 
Milk, as the rose-bud drinks the dew. 

Mary from childhood rose to youth, 
In paths of innocence and truth ; 
— Train'd by her parent, from her birth, 
To go to heaven by way of earth. 
She was to him, in after-life, 
Both as a daughter and a wife. 

Meekness, simplicity, and grace, 
Adorn'd her speech, her air, her face ; 
The spirit, through its earthly mould, 
Broke, as the lily's leaves unfold ; 
Her beauty open'd on the sight. 
As a star trembles into hght. 

Love found that maiden ; love will find 
Way to the coyest maiden's mind ; 
Love found and tried her many a year, 
With hope deferr'd, and boding fear ; 
To the world's end her hero stray'd ; 
Tempests and calms his bark delay'd ; 
What then could her heart-sickness soothe ? 
" The course of true love ne'er ran smooth !" 
Her bosom ached with drear suspense, 
Till sharper trouble drove it thence : 
Affliction smote her father's brain, 
And he became a child again. 

12* 



NARRATIVES. 



Ah ! then, the prayers, the pangs, the tears. 
He breathed, feU, shed on her young years, 
That duteous daughter well repaid, 
Till in the grave she saw him laid, 
Beneath her mother's church-yard stone : 
— There first she felt herself alone ; 
But while she gazed on that cold heap, 
Her parents' bed, and could not weep, 
A still small whisper seem'd to say, 
" Strength shall be given thee as thy day :" 
Then rush'd the tears to her relief; 
A bow was in the cloud of grief. 

Her wanderer now, from clime to clime, 
Return'd, unchanged by tide or time, 
True as the morning to the sun ; 
— Mary and William soon were one ; 
And never rang the village bells 
With sweeter falls or merrier swells, 
Than while the neighbours, young and old. 
Stood at their thresholds, to behold, 
And bless them, till they reach'd the spot. 
Where woodbines girdled Mary's cot, 
Where throstles, perch'd on orchard trees, 
Sang to the hum of garden bees : 
And there — no longer forced to roam — 
William found all the world at home ; 
Yea, more than all the world beside, 
— A warm, kind heart to his allied. 

Twelve years of humble life they spent, 
With food and raiment well content ; 
In flower of youth and flush of health, 
They envied not voluptuous wealth ; 
The wealth of poverty was theirs, 
— Those riches without wings or snares, 
Which honest hands, by daily toil, 
May dig from every generous soil. 
A little farm, while William till'd, 
Mary her household cares fulfill'd ; 



AN EVERY-DAY TALE. 



And love, joy, peace, with guileless mirth, 
Sate round the table, warm'd their hearth ; 
Whence rose, like incense, to the skies, 
Morning and evening sacrifice. 
And contrite spirits found, in prayer. 
That home was heaven, for God was there. 

Meanwhile the May-flowers on their lands 
Were yearly pluck'd by younger hands ; 
New comers watch'd the swallows float. 
And mock'd the cuckoo's double note ; 
Till, head o'er head, in slanting line, 
They stood, — a progeny of nine, 
That might be ten ; — but ere that day, 
The father's life was snatch'd away ; 
Faint from the field one night he came ; 
Fever had seized his sinewy frame, 
And left the strong man, when it pass'd, 
Frail as the sere leaf in the blast ; 
A long, long Avinter's ilhiess, bow'd 
His head ; — spring-daisies deck'd his shroud. 
Oh ! 'twas a bitter day for all. 
The husband's, father's funeral ; 
The dead, the living, and the unborn 
Met there, — were there asunder torn. 

Scarce was he buried out of sight. 
Ere his tenth infant sprang to light, 
And iVIary, from her child-bed throes, 
To instant, utter ruin rose ; 
Harvests had fail'd, and sickness drain'd 
Her frugal stock-purse, long retain'd ; 
Rents, debts, and taxes all fell due. 
Claimants were loud, resources few, 
Small, and remote ; — yet time and care 
Her shatter'd fortunes might repair, 
If but a friend, — a friend in need, — 
Such friend would be a friend indeed, — 
Would, by a mite of succour lent. 
Wrongs irretrievable prevent ! 



NARRATIVES. 



She look'd around for such an one, 

And sigh'd but spake not, — "/s there none?^ 

— Oh ! if he come not ere an hour, 

All will elapse beyond her power, 

And homeless, helpless, hopeless, lost, 

Mary on this cold world be tost 

With all her babes !****» 

Came such a friend ! — I must not say ; 

Mine is a tale of every day : 

But wouldst thou know the worst of all. 

The wormwood mingled with the gall, 

Go \'isit thou, in their distress. 

The widow and the fatherless, 

And thou shalt find such wo as this, 

Such breaking up of earthly bliss. 

Is no strange thing, — but, strange to say ! 

The tale — the truth — of every day. 

Go, visit thov, in their distress. 
The Widow and the Fatherless. 



A TALE WITHOUT A NAME. 

" O woman ! in our hours of ease. 
Uncertain, coy, and hard to please ; 
— When pain and anguish wring the brow, 
A ministering angel thou !" 

Scott's JUarmion, canto vi. 

PART I. 

He had no friend on earth but thee ; 

No hope in heaven above ; 
By day and night, o'er land and sea, 

No solace but thy love : . 
He wander'd here, he wander'd there, 

A fugitive like Cain ; 
And mourn'd like him, in dark despair, 

A brother rashly slain. 



A TALE WITHOUT A NAME. 



Rashly, yet not in sudden wrath, 

They quarrell'd in their pride ; 
He sprang upon his brother's path, 

And smote him that he died. 
A nightmare sat upon his brain, 

All stone within he felt ; 
A death-watch tick'd through every vein. 

Till the dire blow was dealt. 

As from a dream, in pale surprise, 

Waking, the murderer stood ; 
He met tlie victim's closing eyes. 

He saw his brother's blood : 
That blood pursued him on his way, 

A living, murmuring stream ; 
Those eyes before him flash'd dismay, 

With ever-dying gleam. 

In vain he strove to fly the scene. 

And breathe beyond that time ; 
Tormented memory glared between ; 

Immortal seem'd his crime : 
His thoughts, his words, his actions all 

Turn'd on his fallen brother ; 
That hour he never could recall. 

Nor ever live another. 

To him the very clouds stood still. 

The ground appear'd unchanged ; 
One light was ever on the hill, 

— That hill where'er he ranged : 
He heard the brook, the birds, the wind, 

Sound in the glen below ; 
The self-same tree he cower'd behind. 

He struck the self-same blow. 

Yet was not reason quite o'erthrown, 

Nor so benign his lot, 
To dwell in frenzied grief alone, 

All other wo forgot : 



NARRATIVES. 



The world within and world around, 

Clash'd in perpetual strife ; 
Present and past close inter wound 

Through his whole thread of life. 

That thread, inextricably spun, 

Might reach eternity ; 
For ever doing, never done, 

That moment's deed might be ; 
This was a worm that would not die, 

A fire unquenchable : 
Ah ! whither shall the sufferer fly ? 

Fly from a bosom-hell ? 

He had no friend on earth but thee, 

No hope in heaven above ; 
By day and night, o'er land and sea, 

No refuge but thy love ; 
Not time nor place, nor crime, nor shame, 

Could change thy spousal truth ; 
In desolate old age the same 

As in the joy of youth. 

Not death, but infamy, to 'scape. 

He left his native coast ; 
To death in any other shape. 

He long'd to yield the ghost : 
But infamy his steps pursued. 

And haunted every place, 
While death, though hke a lover wooed, 

Fled from his loathed embrace. 

He wander'd here, he wander'd there. 

And she his angel-guide, — 
The silent spectre of despair, 

With mercy at his side ; 
Whose love and loveliness alone 

Shed comfort round his gloom, 
— Pale as the monumental stone 

That watches o'er a tomb. 



A TALE WITHOUT A NAME. 



They cross'd the blue Atlantic flood ; 

A storm their bark assail'd ; 
Stern through the hurricane he stood, 

All hearts, all efforts fail'd : 
With horrid hope, he eyed the waves. 

That flash'd like wild-fires dim ; 
But ocean, midst a thousand graves, 

Denied a grave to him. 

On shore he sought deHrious rest, 

In crowds of busy men. 
When suddenly the yellow pest 

Came reeking from its den : 
The city vanish'd at its breath ; 

He caught the taint, and lay 
A suppliant at the gate of death, 

— Death spum'd the wretch away. 

In solitude of streams and rocks. 

Mountains and forests dread, 
Where nature's free and fearless flocks 

At her own hand are fed. 
They hid their pangs ; — but oh ! to live 

In peace, — In peace to die, — 
Was more than solitude could give, 

Or earth's whole round supply. 

The swampy wilderness their haunt. 

Where fiery panthers prowl, 
Serpents their fatal splendours flaunt, 

And wolves and lynxes howl ; 
Where alligators throng the floods, 

And reptiles, venom-arm'd, 
Infest the air, the fields, the woods. 

They slept, they waked unharm'd. 



NARRATIVES. 



Where the Red Indians, in their ire, 

With havoc mark the way, 
Skulk in dark ambush, -waste with fire, 

Or gorge inhuman prey : 
Their blood no wild marauder shed ; 

Secure without defence, 
AHke, were his devoted head, 

And her meek innocence. 

Weary of loneliness, they turn'd 

To Europe's carnage-field ; 
At glory's Moloch-shrine, he burn'd 

His hated breath to yield : 
He plunged into the hottest strife ; 

He dealt the deadliest blows ; 
To every foe exposed his hfe ; 

Powerless were all his foes. 

The iron thunder-bolts, with wings 

Of lightning, shunn'd his course ; 
Harmless the hail of battle rings. 

The bayonet spends its force ; 
The sword to smite him flames aloof. 

Descends, — but strikes in vain ; 
His branded front Avas weapon-proof, 

He wore the mark of Cain. 

" I cannot live, — I cannot die !" 

He mutter'd in despair ; 
" This curse of immortality, 

Oh, could I quit, — or bear !" 
— Of every frantic hope bereft. 

To meet a nobler doom. 
One refuge, — only one, — was left, — 

To stonn th' unyielding tomb. 

Through his own breast the passage lay, 

The steel was in his hand ; 
But fiends upstarting fenced the way. 

And every nerve unmann'd : 



A TALE WITHOUT A NAME. 



The heart that ached its blood to spill, 

With palsying horror died ; 
The arm, rebellious to his will, 

Hung withering at his side. 

O woman ! wonderful in love, 

Whose weakness is thy power, 
How did thy spirit rise above 

The conflict of that hour ! 
— She found him prostrate ; — not a sigh 

Escaped her tortured breast, 
Nor fell one tear-drop from her eye, 

Where torrents were supprest. 

Her faithful bosom stay'd his head, 

That throbb'd with fever heat ; 
Her eye serene compassion shed. 

Which his could never meet : 
Her arms enclasp'd his shuddering frame, 

While at his side she kneel'd. 
And utter'd nothing but his name, 

Yet all her soul reveal'd. 

Touch'd to the quick, he gave no sign 

By gentle word or tone ; 
In him affection could not shine, 

'Twas fire within a stone ; 
Which no collision by the way 

Could startle into light. 
Though the poor heart that held it, lay 

Wrapt in Cimmerian night. 

It was not always thus ; — erewhile 

The kindness of his youth. 
His brow of innocence, and smile 

Of unpretending truth, — 
Had left such strong delight, — that she 

Would oft recall the time. 
And live in golden memory. 

Unconscious of his crime. 



NARRATIVES. 



Though self-abandon'd now to fate, 

The passive prey of grief, 
Sullen, and cold, and desolate, 

He shunn'd, he spurn'd relief: 
Still onward in its even course 

Her pure affection press'd. 
And pour'd with soft and silent force 

Its sweetness through his breast. 

Thus Sodom's melancholy lake 

No turn or current knows ; 
Nor breeze, nor billow sounding, break 

The horror of repose ; 
While Jordan, through the sulphurous brine. 

Rolls a translucent stream, 
Whose waves with answering beauty shine 

To every changing beam. 



At length the hardest trial came, 

Again they cross the seas ; 
The waves their wilder fury tame. 

The storm becomes a breeze : 
Homeward their easy course they hold. 

And now in radiant view. 
The purple forelands, tinged with gold, 

Larger and lovelier grew. 

The vessel on the tranquil tide 

Then seem'd to lie at rest. 
While Albion, in maternal pride. 

Advanced with open breast 
To bid them welcome on the main : 

— Both shrunk from her embrace ; 
Cold grew the pulse through every vein ; 

He turn'd away his face. 



A TALE WITHOUT A NAME. 



Silent, apart, on deck he stands 

In ecstasy of wo : 
A brother's blood is on his hands, 

He sees, he hears if flow : 
Wilder than ocean tempest-wrought. 

Though deadly calm his look ; 
His partner read his inmost thought, 

And strength her limbs forsook. 

Then first, then last, a pang she proved 

Too exquisite to bear : 
She fell, — he caught her, — strangely moved. 

Roused from intense despair ; 
Alive to feelings long unknown. 

He wept upon her cheek. 
And call'd her in as kind a tone 

As love's own lips could speak. 

Her spirit heard that voice, and felt 

Arrested on its flight ; 
Back to the mansion where it dwelt. 

Back from the gates of light. 
That open'd paradise in trance. 

It hasten'd from afar, 
Gluick as the startled seaman's glance 

Turns from the polar star. 

She breathed again, look'd up, and lo ! 

Those eyes that knew not tears, 
With streams of tenderness o'erflow ; 

That heart, through hopeless years. 
The den of fiends in darkness chain'd, 

That would not, dared not rest, 
Affection fervent, pure, unfeign'd. 

In speechless sighs express'd. 

Content to live, since now she knew 

What love beUeved before ; 
Content to live, since he was true, 

And love could ask no more, — 



NARRATIVES, 



This VOW to righteous heaven she made, 

— " Whatever ills befall, 
Patient, unshrinking, undismay'd, 

I'll freely suffer all." 

They land, — they take the wonted road. 

By twice ten years estranged ; 
The trees, the fields, their old abode. 

Objects and men had changed : 
Famihar faces, forms endear'd, 

Each well-remember'd name. 
From earth itself had disappeared, 

Or seem'd no more the same. 

The old were dead, the young were old ; 

Children to men had sprung ; 
And every eye to them was cold. 

And silent every tongue ; 
Friendless, companionless, they roam 

Amidst their native scene ; 
In drearier banishment at home, 

Than savage climes had been. 



Yet worse she fear'd ; — nor long they lay 

In safety or suspense ; 
Unslumbering justice seized her prey. 

And dragg'd the culprit thence : 
Amid the dungeon's darken'd walls, 

Down on the cold damp floor, 
A wreck of misery he falls, 

Close to the bolted door. 

And she is gone, — while he remains, 

Bewilder'd in the gloom. 
To brood in solitude and chains 

Upon a felon's doom : 



A TALE WITHOUT A NAME. 



Yes, she is gone, — and he forlorn 

Must groan the night away. 
And long to see her face at morn, 

More welcome than the day. 

The morning comes, — she re-appears 

With grief-dissemhhng wiles ; 
A sad serenity of tears. 

An agony of smiles. 
Her looks assume ; his spectral woes 

Are vanish'd at the sight ; 
And all within him seem'd repose, 

And all around him light. 

Never since that mysterious hour, 

When kindred blood Avas spilt, — 
Never had aught in nature power 

To soothe corroding guilt, 
Till the glad moment when she cross'd 

The threshold of that place, 
And the wild rapture, Avhen he lost 

Himself in her embrace. 

Even then, while on her neck he hung, 

Ere yet a Avord they spoke. 
As by a fiery serpent stung. 

Away at once he broke : 
Frenzy, remorse, confusion, burst 

In tempest o'er his brain ; 
He felt accused, condemn'd, accurst. 

He was himself again. 

Days, Aveeks, and months had mark'd the flight 

Of time's unwearied wing. 
Ere winter's long, lugubrious night 

Relented into spring : 
To him who pined for death's release, 

An age the space betAveen ! 
To her Avho could not hope for peace, 

HoAv fugitive the scene ! 



NARRATIVES. 



In vain she chid forewarning fears, 

In vain repress'd her wo, 
Alone, unseen, her sighs and tears 

Would freely heave and flow : 
Yet ever in his sight, by day, 

Her looks were calm and kind, 
And when at evening torn away, 

She left her soul behind. 

Hark ! — hark ! — the judge is at the gate. 

The trumpets' thrilling tones 
Ring through the cells, the voice of fate ! 

Re-echo'd thence in groans : 
The sound hath reach'd her ear, — she stands 

In marble-chillness dumb ; 
He too hath heard, and smites his hands : 

" I come," he cried, " I come." 

Before the dread tribunal now. 

Firm in collected pride, 
Without a scowl upon his brow. 

Without a pang to hide. 
He stood ; — superior in that hour 

To recreant fear and shame ; 
Peril itself inspired the power 

To meet the worst that came. 

'Twas like the tempest when he sought 

Fate in the swallowing flood ; 
'Twas like the battle, when he fought 

For death through seas of blood: 
— A violence which soon must break 

The heart that would not bend, 
— A heart that almost ceased to ache 

In hope of such an end. 

On him, while every eye was fix'd. 

And every lip express'd, 
Without a voice, the rage unmix'd, 

That boil'd in every breast ; 



A TALE WITHOUT A NAME. 



It seem'd, as though that deed abhorr'd, 

In years far distant done, 
Had cut asunder ever cord 

Of fellowship but one, — 

That one indissolubly bound 

A feeble Avoman's heart : 
—Faithful in every trial found, 

Long had she borne her part ; 
Now at his helpless side alone. 

Girt with infuriate crowds, 
Like the new moon her meekness shone, 

Pale through a gulf of clouds. 

Ah ! well might every bosom yearn. 

Responsive to her sigh ; 
And every visage, dark and stern. 

Soften beneath that eye : 
Ah ! well might every lip of gall 

Th' unutler'd curse suspend ; 
Its tones for her in blessings fall. 

Its breath in prayer ascend. 

" Guilty !" — that thunder-striking sound. 

All shudder'd when they heard ; 
A burst of horrid joy around 

Hail'd the tremendous Avord ; 
Check'd in a moment, — she was there ! 

The instinctive groan was hush'd ; 
Nature, that forced it, cried, " Forbear;" 

Indignant justice blush'd. 



One wo is past, another speeds 
To brand and seal his doom ; ' 

The third day's failing beam recedes. 
She watch'd it into gloom : 

That night, how swift in its career, 
It flew from sun to sun ! 



NARRATIVES. 

That night, the last of many a dear, 
And many a dolorous one ! — 

That night, by special grace she wakes 

In the lone convict's cell, 
With him for whom the morrow breaks, 

To light to heaven or hell : 
Dread sounds of preparation rend 

The dungeon's ponderous roof; 
The hammer's doubling strokes descend. 

The scaffold creeks aloof. 

She watch'd his features through the shade, 

Which glimmering embers broke ; 
Both from their inmost spirit pray'd ; 

They pray'd, but seldom spoke : 
Moments meanwhile were years to him ; 

Her grief forgot their flight. 
Till on the hearth the fire grew dim ; 

She turn'd, and lo ! the light ; — 

The light less welcome to her eyes, 

The loveliest light of morn. 
Than the dark glare of felon's eyes 

Through grated cells forlorn : 
The cool fresh breeze from heaven that blew, 

The free lark's mounting strains. 
She felt in drops of icy dew. 

She heard, like groans and chains. 

" Farewell !" — 'twas but a word, yet more 

Was utter'd in that sound, 
Than love had ever told before. 

Or sorrow yet had found : 
They kiss like meeting flames, — they part. 

Like flames asunder driven ; 
Lip cleaves to lip, heart beats on heart, 

Till soul from soul is riven. 

Q,uick hurried thence, — the sullen bell 
Its pausing peal began ; 



A TALE WITHOUT A NAME. 



She hearkens,— 'tis the dying knell, 

Rung for the hving man : 
The mourner reach'd her lonely bower, 

Fell on her widow'd bed, 
And found, through one entrancing hour, 

The quiet of the dead. 

She woke,' — and knew he was no more : 

" Thy dream of life is past ; 
That pang with thee, that pang is o'er. 

The bitterest and the last !" 
She cried : — then scenes of sad amaze 

Flash'd on her inward eye ; 
A field, a troop, a crowd to gaze, 

A murderer led to die ! 

He eyed the ignominious tree, 

Look'd round, but saw no friend ; 
Was plunged into eternity ; 

— Is this — is this the end ? 
Her spirit follow'd him afar 

Into the world unknown, 
And saw him standing at that bar, 

Where each must stand alone. 

Silence and darkness hide the rest 

— ^Long she survived to mourn ; 
But peace sprang up within her breast, 

From trouble meekly borne : 
And higher, holier joys had she, 

A Christian's hopes above, 
The prize of suffering constancy, 

The crown of faithful love. 



NARRATIVES, 



A SNAKE IN THE GRASS. 

A TALE FOR CHILDREN : FOUNDED ON FACTS. 

She had a secret of her own, 

That Httle girl of whom we speak, 

O'er which she oft would muse alone. 
Till the hlush came across her cheek, 

A rosy cloud, that glow'd awhile, 

Then melted in a sunny smile. 

There was so much to charm the eye. 
So much to move dehghtful thought, 

Awake at night she loved to lie, 

Darkness to her that image brought ; 

She murmur'd of it in her dreams, 

Like the low sounds of gurgling streams. 

What secret thus the soul possess' d 
Of one so young and innocent ? 

Oh ! nothing but a robin's nest. 
O'er which in ecstasy she bent ; 

That treasure she herself had found, 

With five brown eggs, upon the ground. 

When first it flash'd upon her sight. 
Bolt flew the dam above her head ; 

She stoop'd, and almost shriek'd with fright ; 
But spying soon that little bed 

With feathers, moss, and horse-hairs twined, 

Rapture and Avonder fiU'd her mind. 

Breathless and beautiful she stood. 
Her ringlets o'er her bosom fell ; 

With hands uplift, in attitude. 

As though a pulse might break the spell. 

While through the shade her pale, fine face 

Shone like a star amidst the place. 



A SXAKE IN THE GRASS. 



She stood so silent, stay'd so long, . 

The parent-birds forgot their fear ; 
Cock-robin trill'd his small, sweet song. 

In notes like dew-drops trembling, clear ; 
From spray to spray the shyer hen 
Dropt softly on her nest again. 

There Lucy mark'd her slender bill 
On this side, and on that her tail, 

Peer'd o'er the edge, — while, fix'd and still, 
Two bright black eyes her own assail, 

Which, in eye-language, seem to say, 

" Peep, pretty maiden ! then, aAvay !" 

Away, away, at length she crept. 

So pleased, she knew not how she trode. 

Yet light on tottering tiptoe stept, 

As if birds' eggs strew'd all the road ; 

With folded arms, and lips compress'd, 

To keep her joy Avithin her breast. 

Morn, noon, and eve, from day to day, 
By stealth she visited that spot : 

Alike her lessons and her play 

Were slightly conn'd, or half forgot ; 

And when the callow young were hatch'd, 

With infant fondness Lucy watch'd : — 

Watch'd the kind parents dealing food 
To clamorous suppliants all agape ; 

Watch'd the small, naked, unform'd brood. 
Improve in size, and plume, and shape. 

Till feathers clad the fluttering things. 

And the whole group seem'd bills and wings. 

Unconsciously within her breast. 
Where many a brooding fancy lay. 

She plann'd to bear the tiny nest. 
And chirping choristers away. 

In stately cage to tune their throats. 

And learn untaught their mother-notes. 



NARRATIVES. 



One morn, when fairly fledged for flight, 

Blithe Lucy, on her visit, found 
What seem'd a necklace, glittering bright, 

Twined round the nest, tAvined round and round, 
With emeralds, pearls, and sapphires set. 
Rich as my lady's coronet. 

She stretch'd her hand to seize the prize. 

When up a serpent popt its head, 
But glid like wild-fire from her eyes. 

Hissing and rustling as it fled ; 
She utter'd one short shrilling scream. 
Then stood, as startled from a dream. 

Her brother Tom, who long had knoAvn 
That something drew her feet that way. 

Curious to catch her there alone. 
Had foUow'd her that fine May-day ; 

— Lucy, bewilder'd by her trance. 

Came to herself at his first glance. 

Then in her eyes sprang welcome tears ; 

They fell as showers in April fall ; 
He kiss'd her, coax'd her, soothed her fears. 

Till she in frankness told him all : 
— Tom was a bold, adventurous boy. 
And heard the dreadful tale with joy. 

For he had learnt, — in some far land, — 
How children catch the sleeping snake ; 

Eager himself to try his hand. 
He cut a hazel from the brake. 

And like a hero set to work. 

To make a lithe, long-handled fork. 

Brother and sister then withdrew. 
Leaving the nestlings safely there ; 

Between their heads the mother flew. 
Prompt to resume her nursery care : 

But Tom, whose breast for glory burn'd. 

In less than half an hour return'd. 



A SNAKE IN THE GRASS, 



With him came Ned, as cool and sly 

As Tom Avas resolute and stout ; 
So, fair and softly, they drew nigh, 

Cowering and keeping sharp look-out, 
Till they had reach'd the copse, — to see, 
But not alarm the enemy. 

Guess, with what transport they descried, 

How, as before, the serpent lay 
Coil'd round the nest, in slumbering pride ; — 

The urchins chuckled o'er their prey, 
And Tom's right hand was lifted soon. 
Like Greenland whaler's with harpoon. 

Across its neck the fork he brought, 

And pinn'd it fast upon the ground ; 
The reptile woke, and quick as thought 

Curl'd round the stick, curl'd round and round 
While, head and tail, Ned's nimble hands 
Tied at each end, with pack-thread bands. 
Scarce was the enemy secured. 

When Lucy timidly drew near, 
But by their shouting Avell assured. 

Eyed the green captive void of fear ; 
The lads, stark wild Avith victory, flung 
Their caps aloft, — they danced, they sung. 

But Lucy, with an anxious look, 

Turn'd to her own dear nest, when lo ! 

To legs and wings the young ones took. 
Hopping and tumbling to and fro ; 

The parents chattering from above 

With all the earnestness of love. 

Alighting now among their train, 

They peck'd them on new feats to try ; 

But many a lesson seem'd in vain. 
Before the giddy things would fly ; 

Lucy both laugh'd and cried, to see 

How ill they play'd at hberty. 



NARRATIVES. 



I need not tell the snake's sad doom, 
You may be sure he lived not long ; 

Cork'd in a bottle for a tomb, 
Preserved in spirits and in song. 

His skin in Tom's museum shines, 

You read his story in these lines. 



THE CAST-AWAY SHIP. 

The subjects of the following poems were suggested by the loss of the Blenheim, 
commanded by Sir Thomas Trowbridge, which was separated from the ves- 
sels under its convoy, during a storm in the Indian Ocean.— The Admiral's 
son afterwards made a voyage, without success, in search of his father. — 
Trowbridge was one of Nelson's captains at the Battle of the Nile, but his 
ship unfortunately ran a-grouiid as ha was bearing down on the enemy. 

A VESSEL sail'd from Albion's shore, 

To utmost India bound. 
Its crest a hero's pendant bore, 

With broad sea-laurels crown'd 
In many a fierce and noble fight, 
Though foil'd on that Egyptian night 

When Gallia's host was drown'd, 
And Nelson o'er his country's foes, 
Like the destroying angel rose. 

A gay and gallant company. 

With shouts that rend the air, 
For warrior-vi^reaths upon the sea, 

Their joyful brows prepare : 
But many a maiden's sigh was sent, 
And many a mother's blessing went, 

And many a father's prayer. 
With that exulting ship to sea. 
With that undaunted company. 



The deep, that like a cradled child 
In breathing slumber lay, 



THE CAST-AWAY SHIP. 



More warmly blush'd, more sweetly smiled, 

As rose the kindling day : 
Through ocean's mirror, dark and clear. 
Reflected clouds and skies appear 

In morning's rich array ; 
The land is lost, the waters glow, 
'Tis heaven above, around, below. 

Majestic o'er the sparkling tide, 

See the tall vessel sail. 
With swelling winds in shadowy pride, 

A swan before the gale : 
Deep-laden merchants rode behind ; 
— But, fearful of the fickle wind, , 

Britannia's cheek grew pale. 
When, lessening through the flood of light, 
Their leader vanish'd from her sight. 

Oft had she hail'd its trophied prow, 

Victorious from the war, 
And banner' d masts that would not bow, 

Though riven with many a scar ; 
Oft had her oaks their tribute brought, 
To rib its flanks, with thunder fraught ; 

But late her evil star 
Had cursed it on its homeward way, 
— " The spoiler shall become the prey." 

Thus warn'd, Britannia's anxious heart 

Throbb'd with prophetic wo. 
When she beheld that ship depart, 

A fair ill-omen'd show ! 
So views the mother, through her tears, 
The daughter of her hopes and fears, 

When hectic beauties glow 
On the frail cheek, where sweetly bloom 
The roses of an early tomb. 

No fears the brave adventurers knew, 
Peril and death they spurn'd ; 



NARRATIVES. 

Like full-fledged eagles forth they flew ; 

Jove's birds, that proudly burn'd 
In battle-hurricanes to wield 
His hghtnings on the billowy field ; 

And many a look they turn'd 
O'er the blue waste of waves to spy 
A Gallic ensign in the sky. 

But not to crush the vaunting foe, 

In combat on the main, 
Nor perish by a glorious blow, 

In mortal triumph slain. 
Was their unutterable fate ; 
— That story would the Muse relate. 

The song might rise in vain ; 
In ocean's deepest, darkest bed, 
The secret slumbers with the dead. 

On India's long-expecting strand 
Their sails were never furl'd ; 
Never on known or friendly land, 

By storms their keel was hurl'd ; 
Their native soil no more they trod. 
They rest beneath no hallow'd sod ; 

Throughout the living world. 
This sole memorial of their lot 
Remains, — they were, and they are not. 

The spirit of the Cape* pursued 
Their long and toilsome way ; 

At length, in ocean-solitude, 
He sprang upon his prey ; 

" Havoc !" the shipwreck-demon cried. 

Loosed all his tempests on the tide, 
Gave all his hghtnings play; 



*The Cape of Good Hope, formerly called the Cape of Storms. — See Camoen'. 
Lusiad, book v. 



THE SEQUEL. 



The abyss recoil'd before the blast, 
Firm stood the seamen till the last. 

Like shooting stars, athwart the gloom 
The merchant-sails were sped ; 

Yet oft, before its midnight doom, 
They mark'd the high mast-head 

Of that devoted vessel, lost 

By winds and floods, now seen, now lost ; 
While every gun-fire spread 

A dimmer flash, a fainter roar ; 

— At length they saw, they heard no more. 

There are to whom that ship was dear, 

For love and kindred's sake ; 
When these the voice of Rumour hear, 

Their inmost heart shall quake, 
Shall doubt, and fear, and wish, and grieve, 
BeHeve, and long to unbelieve, . 

But never cease to ache ; 
Still doom'd, in sad suspense, to bear 
The Hope that keeps ahve Despair. 



THE SEaUEL. 



He sought his sire from shore to shore. 

He sought him day by day ; 
The prow he track'd was seen no more, 

Breasting the ocean-spray : 
Yet, as the winds his voyage sped, ■ 
He sail'd above his father's head. 

Unconscious where it lay. 
Deep, deep beneath the rolling main ; 
— He sought his sire ; he sought in vain. 



NARRATIVES. 



Son of the brave ! no longer weep ; 

Still with afTection true, 
Along the wild disastrous deep, 

Thy lather's course pursue : 
Full in his wake of glory steer, 
His spirit prompts thy bold career, 

His compass guides thee through ; 
So, while thy thunders awe the sea, 
Britain shall find thy sire in thee. 



TRIBUTARY POEMS. 



TO THE MEMORY OF 



THE LATE RICHARD REYNOLDS, 

Who died on the 10th of September, 1816. 



The author has nothing to say in favour of the following verses, except that 
they are the sincere tribute of his affections, as well as his mind, to the Christian 
virtues of the deceased. 

Richard Reynolds was one of the Society of Friends, but, as far as human 
judgment can extend, he was one of those who also are Christians, not in word 
only but in deed. To his memory the inhabitants of Bristol have already insti- 
tuted— and may their posterity perpetuate it:— the noblest monument, perhaps, 
that man ever raised in honour of his fellow-man. This will be sufficiently 
e.xplaiiied bv the following advertisement :— 

" At a general meeting of the inhabitants of Bristol, held in the Guildhall of 
that city, on Wednesday, the 2(1 October, 1818, the right worshipful the Mayor 
in the chair:— It was unanimously resolved, That, in consequence of the severe 
loss which society has sustained by the death of ihe venerable Richard Reynolds, 
and in order to perpetuate, as far as may be, the great and important benefits he 
has conferred upon the city of Bristol and its vicinity, and to excite others to 
imitate the example of the departed philanthropist, an Association be formed 
under the designation of 'Reynolds's Commemoration Society.' That the 
members of the Society do consist of life subscribe s of ten guineas or upwards, 
and annual subscribers of one guinea or upwards; and that the object of this 
Society be to grant relief to persons in necessitous circumstances, and also occa- 
sional assistance to other benevolent institutions in or near the city, to enable 
them to continue or increase their usefulness, and that especial regard be had to 
the Samaritan Society, of which Richard Reynolds was the founder. That the 
cases to be assisted and relieved be entirely in the discretion of the committee; 
but it is recommended to them not to grant any relief or assistance without a 
careful investigation of the circumstances of each case ; and that, in imitation of 
the example of the individual whom the Society is designed to commemorate, it 
be considered as a sacred duty of the committee, to the latest period of its 
existence, to be wholly uninfluenced in the distribution of its funds by any con- 
siderations of sect or party." 

The third piece in the ensuing series, entitled "A Good Man's Monument, 
was intended for a figurative representation of this sublime and universal cha- 
rity. The resemblance ought to have been sufHciently obvious, without being 
pointed out here. 



TRIBUTARY POEMS. 



I. THE DEATH OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 

This place is holy ground ; 

World, with thy cares, away ! 
Silence and darkness reign around, 
But, lo ! the break of day : 
What bright and sudden dawn appears, 
To shine upon this scene of tears ? 

'Tis not the morning hght. 

That wakes the lark to sing ; 
'Tis not a meteor of the night, 
Nor track of angel's wing : 
It is an uncreated beam, 
Like that which shone on Jacob's dream. 

Eternity and Time 

Met for a moment here ; 
From earth to heaven, a scale sublirtie 
Rested on either sphere, 
Whose steps a saintly figure trod. 
By Death's cold hand led home to God. 

He landed in our view. 

Midst flaming hosts above ; 
Whose ranks stood silent, while he drew 
Nigh to the throne of love, 
And meekly took the lowest seat, 
Yet nearest his Redeemer's feet. 

Thrill'd with ecstatic awe. 

Entranced our spirits fell, 
And saw — yet wist not what they saw 
And heard — no tongue can tell 
What sounds the ear of rapture caught, 
What glory fill'd the eye of thought. 

Thus far above the pole. 
On wings of mounting fire, 

Faith may pursue th' enfranchised soul, 
But soon her pinions tire ; 



THE LATE RICHARD REYNOLDS. 



It is not given to mortal man 
Eternal mysteries to scan. 

— Behold the bed of death ; 
This pale and lovely clay ; 
Heard ye the sob of parting breath ? 
Mark'd ye the eye's last ray ? 
No ; — hfe so sweetly ceased to be, 
It lapsed in immortality. 

Could tears revive the dead, 

Rivers should swell our eyes ; 
Could sighs recall the spirit fled, 
We would not quench our sighs. 
Till love relumed this aUer'd mien, 
And all th' imbodied soul were seen. 

Bury the dead ; — and weep 
In stillness o'er the loss ; 
Bury the dead ; — in Christ they sleep, 
Who bore on earth his cross. 
And from the grave their dust shall rise, 
In his own image \o the skies. 



II. THE MEMORY OF THE JUST. 

Strike a louder, loftier lyre ; 
Bolder, sweeter strains employ ; 
Wake, Remembrance ! — and inspire 
Sorrow with the song of joy. 

Who was He, for whom our tears 
Flow'd, and will not cease to flowl 

— Full of honours and of years. 
In the dust his head lies low. 



Yet resurgent from the dust. 
Springs aloft his mighty name ; 

For the memory of the Just 
Lives in everlasting fame. 



TRIBUTARY POEMS. 

He was One, whose open face 
Did his inmost heart reveal ; 

One, who wore with meekest grace, 
On his forehead, Heaven's broad seal. 

Kindness all his looks express'd. 

Charity was every word; 
Him the eye beheld, and bless'd , 

And the ear rejoiced that heard. 

Like a patriarchal sage, 

Holy, humble, courteous, mild. 

He could blend the awe of age 
With the sweetness of a child. 

As a cedar of the Lord, 

On the height of Lebanon, 
Shade and shelter doth afford. 

From the tempest and the sun : — 

While in green luxuriant prime, 
Fragrant airs its boughs diffuse. 

From its locks it shakes sublime, 
O'er the hills, the morning dews : — 

Thus he flourish'd, tall and strong. 
Glorious in perennial health ; 

Thus he scatter'd, late and long, 
All his plenitude of wealth ! — 

Wealth, which prodigals had deem'd 
Worth the soul's uncounted cost ; 

Wealth, which misers had esteem'd 
Cheap, though heaven itself were los 

This, with free unsparing hand 
To the poorest child of need. 

This he threw around the land. 
Like the sower's precious seed. 

In the world's great harvest day. 
Every grain on every ground, 




Stony, thorny, by the way, 

Shall an hundred fold be found. 

Yet, like noon's refulgent blaze. 

Though he shone from east to west, 

Far withdrawn from public gaze, 
Secret goodness pleased him best. 

As the sun, retired from sight. 

Through the purple evening gleams, 

Or, unrisen, clothes the night. 
In the morning's golden beams : 

Thus beneath th' horizon dim, 
He would hide his radiant head, 

And on eyes that saw not him. 
Light and consolation shed. 

Oft his silent spirit went. 

Like an angel from the throne. 

On benign commissions bent, 
In the fear of God alone. 

Then the widow's heart would sing. 
As she turn'd her wheel, for joy ; 

Then the bliss of hope would spring 
On the outcast orphan boy. 

To the blind, the deaf, the lame. 

To the ignorant and vile. 
Stranger, captive, slave, he came 

With a welcome and a smile. 

Help to all he did dispense. 
Gold, instruction, raiment, food. 

Like the gifts of Providence, 
To the evil and the good. 

Deeds of mercy, deeds unknown, 

Shall eternity record, 
Which he durst not call his own. 

For he did them to the Lord. 



TRIBUTARY POEMS. 



As the Earth puts forth her flowers, 
Heaven-ward breathing from below ; 

As the clouds descend in showers, 
When the southern breezes blow ; 

Thus his renovated mind, 

Warm with pure celestial love, 

Sheds its influence on mankind. 
While its hopes aspired above. 

Full of faith at length he died. 
And, victorious in the race, 

Won the crown for which he vied 
— Not of merit, but of grace. 



III. A GOOD MAN S MONUMENT. 

The pyre, that burns the aged Bramin's bones, 
Runs cold in blood, and issues living groans, 
When the whole Harem with the husband dies, 
And demons dance around the sacrifice. 

In savage realms, when tyrants yield their breath, 
Herds, flocks, and slaves, attend their lord in death : 
Arms, chariots, carcases, a horrid heap, 
Rust at his side, or share his mouldering sleep. 

When heroes fall triumphant on the plain ; 
For millions conquer'd, and ten thousands slain : 
For cities levell'd, kingdoms drench'd in blood, 
Navies annihilated on the flood ; 
— The pageantry of public grief requires 
The splendid homage of heroic lyres ; 
And genius moulds impassion'd brass to breathe 
The dauntless spirit of the dust beneath, 
Calls marble honour from its cavern'd bed. 
And bids it live — the proxy of the dead. 

Reynolds expires, a nobler chief than these ; 
No blood of widows stains his obsequies ; 



But widows' tears, in sad bereavement, fall, 

And foundling' voices on their father call : 

No slaves, no hecatombs, his relics crave. 

To gorge the worm, and crowd his quiet grave ; 

But sweet repose his slumbering ashes find, 

As if in Salem's sepulchre enshrined ; 

And watching angels waited for the day, 

When Christ should bid them roll the stone away. 

Not in the fiery hurricane of strife, 
'Midst slaugliter'd legions, he resign'd his life ; 
But peaceful as the twilight's parting ray. 
His spirit vanish'd from its house of clay. 
And left on kindred souls such power imprest, 
They seem'd with him to enter into rest. 
Hence no vain pomp, his glory to prolong. 
No airy immortality of song ; 
No sculptured imagery, of bronze or stone. 
To make his lineaments for ever known, 
Reynolds requires : — his labours, merits, name. 
Demand a monument of surer fame ; 
Not to record and praise his virtues past. 
But show them living, while the world shall last ; 
Not to bewail one Reynolds, snatch'd from earth, 
But give, in every age, a Reynolds birth ; 
In every age a Reynolds ; born to stand 
A prince among the worthies of the land, 
By Nature's title, written in his face : 
More than a prince — a sinner saved by grace. 
Prompt at his meek and lowly Master's call 
To prove himself the minister of all. 

Bristol ! to thee the eye of Albion turns ; 
At thought of thee thy country's spirit burns ; 
For in thy walls, as on her dearest grou.nd. 
Are " British minds and British manners" found : 
And 'midst the wealth, which Avon's Avaters pour 
From every clime, on thy commercial shore. 
Thou hast a native mine of Avorth untold : 
Thine heart is 7iot encased in rigid gold, 



TRIBUTARY POEMS. 



Wither'd to mummy, steel'd against distress ; 

No — free as Severn's waves, that spring to bless 

Their parent hills, but as they roll expand 

In argent beauty through a lovelier land, 

And widening, brightening to the western sun, 

In floods of glory through thy channel run ; 

Thence, mingling with the boundless tide, are hurl'd 

In Ocean's chariot round the utmost world : 

Thus flow thine heart-streams, warm and unconfmed, 

At home, abroad, to wo of every kind. 

Worthy Avert thou of Reynolds ; — worthy he 

To rank the first of Britons even in thee. 

Reynolds is dead ; — thy lap receives his dust 

Until the resurrection of the just : 

Reynolds is dead ; but while thy rivers roll, 

Immortal in thy bosom live his soul ! 

Go, build his monument : — and let it be 
Firm as the land, but open as the sea. 
Low in his grave the strong foundations lie, 
Yet be the dome expansive as the sky, 
On crystal pillars resting from above. 
Its sole supporters — ivorks of faith and love; 
So clear, so pure, that to the keenest sight. 
They cast no shadow : all within be Hght ; 
No walls divide the area, nor enclose ; 
Charter the whole to every wind that blows ; 
Then rage the tempest, flash the lightnings blue, 
And thunders roll, — they pass unharming through. 

One simple altar in the midst be placed, 
With this, and only this, inscription graced, 
The song of angels at Immanuel's birth, 
" Glory to God ! good will and peace on earth." 
There be thy duteous sons a tribe of priests, 
Not offering incense, nor the blood of beasts. 
But with their gifts upon that altar spread ; 
— Health to the sick, and to the hungry bread. 
Beneficence to all, their hands shall deal, 
With Reynolds' single eye and hallow'd zeal 



IN MEMORY OF ROWLAND HODGSON, ESQ. 

Pain, want, misfortune, thither shall repair; 
Folly and vice reclaim'd shall worship there 
The God of him — in whose transcendent mind 
Stood sKch a temple, free to all mankind : 
Thy God, thrice-honour'd city ! bids thee raise 
That fallen temple, to the end of days : 
Obey his voice ; fulfil thine high intent ; 
— Yea, be thyself the Good Mail's Monument ! 



TO THE MEMORY OF 

ROWLAND HODGSON, ESQ., 

OF SHEFFIELD; 

Who departed this life January 27, 1837, aged 63 years. Through a long period 
of severe bodily affliction, aggravated in the sequel by loss of sight, he sig- 
nally exemplified the Christion graces of fait li, hope, and charity, with hum- 
ble resignation to the will of God. He had been from his youth one of the 
most active, liberal, and unwearied supporters of benevolent and evangelical 
institutions throughout this neighbourhood and elsewhere, in foreign lands 
as well as at home. The writer of these lines had the happiness to be his 
travelling companion on annual visits and temporary sojourns, which they 
made together in many parts of the kingdom, from the autumn of 1817 to the 
same season of 1836. 

PART I. 

Go where thy heart had gone before, 

And thy heart's treasure lay ; 
Go, and with open'd eye explore 

Heaven's uncreated day : 
Light in the Lord, light's fountain, see, 
And light in Him for ever be. 

But darkness thou has left behind ; 

No sign, no sight, nor sound, 
At home, abroad, of thee I find, 

Where thou wert ever found ; 
Then gaze I on thy vacant place. 
Till my soul's eye meets thy soul's face : — 



TRIBUTARY POEMS. 



As, many a time, quite through the veil 

Of flesh 'twas wont to shine. 
When thy meek aspect, saintly pale, 

In kindness turn'd to mine. 
And the quench'd eye its film forgot, 
Look'd full on me, — yet saw me not ! 

Then, through the body's dim eclipse, 

What humble accents broke. 
While, breathing prayer or praise, thy hps 

Of light within thee spoke ; 
Midst Egypt's darkness to be felt. 
Thy mind in its own Goshen dwelt. 

Nor less in days of earher health. 

When life to thee was dear. 
Borne on the flowing tide of wealth, 

To me this truth was clear. 
That hope in Christ was thy best health, 
Riches that make not wings thy wealth. 

When frequent sickness bow'd thy head. 

And every labouring breath, 
As with a heavier impulse, sped 

Thy downward course to death, 
Faith falter'd not that hope to show. 
Though words, like life's last drops, fell slow. 

How often Avhen I turn'd away. 

As having seen the last 
Of thee on earth, my heart would say, 

— " When my few days are past. 
Such strength be mine, though nature shrink. 
The cup my Father gives, to drink !" 

I saw thee slumbering in thy shroud. 

As yonder moon I view. 
Now glimmering through a snow-white cloud, 

Midst heaven's eternal blue ; 
— I saw thee lower'd into the tomb. 
Like that cloud deepening into gloom. 



IN MEMORY OF ROWLAND HODGSON, ESQ. 

All darkness thou hast left behind ; 

— It was not thee they wound 
In dreary grave-clothes, and consign'd 

To perish in the ground ; 
'Twas but thy mantle, dropt in sight. 
When thou wert vanishing in hght. 

That mantle, in earth's wardrobe lain, 

A frail but precious trust. 
Thou wilt reclaim and wear again, 

When, freed from worms and dust. 
The bodies of the saints shall be 
Their robes of immortality. 



These fragments of departed years, 

I gather up and store, 
Since thou, — in mercy to our tears 

And prayers, — art heal'd no more. 
In that last war was no discharge ; 
— Yet walks thy ransom'd soul at large. 

For what, my friend, was death to thee ? 

A king ? a conqueror ? — No ; 
Death, swallow'd up in victory, 

Himself a captive foe. 
Was sent in chains to thy release, 
By Him who on the cross made peace. 

When year by year, on pilgrimage, 

We journey'd side by side, 
And pitch'd and struck, from stage to stage, 

Our tents, had we one guide ? 
One aim ? — are all our meetings past ? 
Must our last parting be our last ? 

Nay, God forbid ! — if hand and heart. 

On earth we loved to roam, 
—Where once to meet is ne'er to part. 

In heaven's eternal home, 



TRIBUTARY POEMS. 



Our Father's house, not made with hands, 
May we renew our friendship's bands ! 

Thus, as I knew thee well and long. 

Thy private worth be told : 
What thou wert more, affection's song 

Presumes not to unfold : 
Thy works of faith and zeal of love. 
Are they not register'd above 1 

Are they not register'd below ? 

— If few their praise record, 
Yet, in the judgment, all shall know, 

Thou didst them to thy Lord ; 
For 'twas thy soul's dehght to cheei 
The least of all his brethren here. 

Though less than even the least of these. 

Thou didst thyself esteem, 
Thou wert a flower-awakening breeze, 

A meadow-watering stream : 
The breeze unseen its odours shed. 
The stream unheard its bounty spread. 

What art thou now ? — Methinks for thee 
Heaven brightens round its king ; 

New beams of the Divinity, 
New-landing spirits bring. 

As God on each his image seals. 

And ray by ray himself reveals. 

While ray by ray those thronging lines 

To one great centre tend. 
Fulness of grace and glory shines 

In Christ, their source and end. 
To show, where all perfections meet, 
The orb of Deity complete. 



THE LATE JOSEPH BUTTERWORTH, ESQ. 



So rest in peace, thou blessed soul ! 

Where sin and sorrow end ; 
So may / follow to the goal, 

— Not thee, not thee, my friend ! 
But Him, whom thou, through joy and wo, 
Thyself didst follow on to know. 

Faint yet pursuing, I am strong, 

Whene'er his steps I trace ; 
Else, slow of heart, and prone to wrong, 

I yet may lose the race. 
If on thy course I fix mine eye, 
And Him in thee not glorify. 

The wild, the mountain-top, the sea, 
The throng'd highway he trode. 

The path to quiet Bethany, 
And Calvary's dolorous road : 

Where He then leads me must be right ; 

— I walk by faith, and not by sight. 



OCCUPY TILL I COME." 



ON THE DEATH OF 



THE LATE JOSEPH BUTTERWORTH, ESQ. 

AN EXEMPLARY CHRISTIAN, PATRIOT, AND PHILANTHROPIST. 

" He was a burning and a shining light :" 
— And is he now eclipsed in hopeless night ? 
No ; faith beholds him near the sapphire throne ; 
Shining more bright than e'er on earth he shone ; 
While, where created splendour all looks dim, 
Heaven's host are glorifying God in him. 



TRIBUTARY POEMS. 



If faith's enraptured vision now be true, 
And things invisible stand forth to view, 
Though eye to eye th' imbodied soul can see, 
Self-lost amidst unclouded Deity, 
He chooses, rather than a seraph's seat. 
The lowest place at his Redeemer's feet ; 
And, with th' eternal weight of glory prest, 
Turns even in paradise to Christ for rest. 

Come we who once beheld his noontide blaze. 
And hid before him our diminish'd rays ; 
Since his translation to a higher sphere. 
We may, we must by our own light appear ; 
When sun and moon their greater beams resign. 
The stars come out ; they cannot choose but shine ; 
With force like his all eyes we cannot strike. 
We may not equal him, but may be Hke : 
Nor let the meanest think his lamp too dim. 
In a dark world the Lord hath need of him; 
By feeble instruments in providence, 
God is well pleased his bounties to dispense ; 
In his economy of grace the same ; 
— The weakest are almighty in his name. 

What though the great, the good, the glorious fall. 
He reigns whose kingdom ruleth over all. 
— Talk not of talents ; — what hast thou to do ? 
Thy duty, be thy portion five or two ; 
Talk not of talents ; — is thy duty done ? 
Thou hadst sufficient, were they ten or one. 
Lord, what my talents are I cannot tell. 
Till thou shalt give me grace to use them well : 
That grace impart, the bliss will then be mine. 
But all the power and all the glory thine. 



IN MEMORY OF EEV, JAMES HARVEY. 



IN MEMORY OF 

THE REV. JAMES HARVEY, 

OP -WESTON FAVELL, NORTH&J^PTONSHIRE, 

WTao died on Christraas-day, 175S, aged forty-three years. 

COMPOSED ON AN OCCASIONAL CELEBRATION OF HIS VIRTUES AND TALENTS, 
AT THAT VILLAGE, IN 1823. 

Where is the house for all the hving found ? 

— Go ask the deaf, the dumb, the dead ; 

All answer, without voice or sound, 

Each resting in his bed ; 

Look down and see, 

Beneath thy feet, 

A place for thee ; 

— There all the living meet. 

Whence come the beauteous progeny of spring ! 

— They hear a still, small voice, " Awake !" 

And Avhile the lark is on the wing. 

From dust and darkness break ; 

Flowers of all hues 

Laugh in the gale. 

Sparkle with dews, 

And dance o'er hill and dale. 

Who leads through trackless space the stars of night ? 

— The Power that made them guides them still ; 

They know Him not, yet, day and night, 

They do his perfect will : 

Unchanged b)'- age, 

They hold on high 

Their pilgrimage 

Of glory round the sky. 



TRIBUTARY POEMS. 



Stars, flowers, and tombs were themes for solemn thought 

With him whose memory we recall ; 

Yet more than eye can see he sought : 

His spirit look'd through all, 

Keenly discern'd 

The truths they teach, 

Their lessons learn'd, 

And gave their silence speech. 

Go, meditate with him among the tombs. 
And there the end of all things view ; 
Visit Vvith him spring's earliest blooms, 
See all things there made new ; 
Thence rapt aloof 
In ecstasy, 

Hear, from heaven's roof, 
Stars preach eternity. 

We call him blessed whom the Lord hath blest 

And made a blessing ; — long to shed 

Light on the living, from his rest, 

And hope around the dead : 

Oh ! for his lot. 

Who dwells in hght, 

Where flowers fade not, 

And stars can find no night. 



TO THE MEMORY OF JOSEPH BROWNE. 



TO THE MEMORY OF 

THE LATE JOSEPH BROWNE, 

OP LOTHSRSDALE, 
ONE OF THE PEOPLE CALLED QUAKERS, 

Who, with seven others of his religious community, had suffered a long confine- 
ment in the Castle of York, and loss of all his worldly property, for conscience 
sake, in the years 1795 and 1796. He was a thoughtful, humble-minded man, 
and occasionally solaced himself with " PrisonAinusewents" in verse, at the 
time when the Author of these Stanzas, in a neighbouring room, was whiling 
away the hours of a shorter captivity in the same manner. 

" Spirit, leave thine house of clay ; 
Lingering Dust, resign thy breath ! 
Spirit, cast thy chains away ; 

Dust, be thou dissolved in death !" 

Thus thy Guardian Angel spoke. 

As he watch'd thy dying bed ; 
As the bonds of life he broke ; 

And the ransom'd captive fled. 

" Prisoner, long detain'd below ; 

Prisoner, now with freedom blest ; 
Welcome from a world of wo. 
Welcome to a land of rest !" 

Thus thy Guardian Angel sang, 

As he bore thy soul on high ; 
While with Hallelujahs rang 

All the region of the sky. 

Ye that mourn a Father's loss, 

Ye that weep a Friend no more, 
Call to mind the Christian cross. 

Which your Friend, your Father, bore. 

Grief, and penury, and pain 
Still attended on his way ; 



And Oppression's scourge and chain, 
More unmerciful than they. 

Yet while travelling in distress 
('Twas the eldest curse of sin) 

Through the world's waste wilderness, 
He had paradise within. 

And along that vale of tears, 

Which his humble footsteps trod. 

Still a shining path appears, 

Where the Mourner walk'd with GOD. 

Till his Master, from above, 

When the promised hour was come, 

Sent the chariot of his love 

To convey the Wanderer home. 

Saw ye not the wheels of fire, 

And the steeds that cleft the wind ? 

Saw ye not his soul aspire, 

When his mantle dropp'd behind ? 

Ye who caught it as it fell, 

Bind that mantle round your breast ; 
So in you his meekness dwell. 

So on you his spirit rest ! 

Yet rejoicing in his lot, 

Still shall Memory love to weep 
O'er the venerable spot 

Where his dear cold relics sleep. 

Grave ! the guardian of his dust. 
Grave ! the treasury of the skies. 

Every atom of thy trust 
Rests in hope again to rise. 

Hark ! the judgment-trumpet calls — 
"Soul, rebuild thine house of clay ; 

Immortality thy walls. 
And Eternity thy day !" 



IX MEMORY OF REV. THOMAS SPENCER. 



TO THE MEMORY OF 

THE REV. THOMAS SPENCER, 

OF LIVERPOOL, 

"Wio -was dro-wned wliile bathing in the tide, on the 5th of August, 
1811, in his 21st year. 

"Thy way is in the sea, and thy path in the great waters; and thy footsteps 
are not known." — Psalm Ixxvii. 19. 

I WILL not sing a mortal's praise ; 
To Thee I consecrate my lays, 

To whom my powers belong ! 
These gifts upon thine altar strown, 

God ! accept — accept thine own ; 
My gifts are Thine, — be Thine alone 

The glory of my song. 

In earth and ocean, sky and air, 
All that is excellent and fair, 

Seen, felt, or understood, 
From one eternal cause descends. 
To one eternal centre tends. 
With God begins, continues, ends, 

The source and stream of good. 

1 worship not the Sun at noon. 

The wandering Stars, the changing Moon, 

The Wind, the Flood, the Flame ; 
I will not bow the votive knee 
To Wisdom, Virtue, Liberty ; 
" There is no God but God" for me; 

— Jehovah is his name. 

Him through all nature I explore, 
Him in his creatures I adore. 



TRIBUTARY POEMS. 



Around, beneath, above ; 
But clearest in the human mind, 
His bright resembhmce Avhen I find. 
Grandeur with purity combined, 

I most admire and love. 

Oh ! there was One, — on earth a while 
He dwelt ; — but transient as a smile 

That turns into a tear, 
His beauteous image pass'd us by ; 
He came, like lightning from the sky, 
He seem'd as dazzling to the eye. 

As prompt to disappear. 

Mild in his undissembling mien. 
Were genius, candour, meekness seen ; 

— The Ups, that loved the truth ; 
The single eye, whose glance sublime 
Look'd to eternity through time ; 
The soul, Avhose hopes were wont to cHmb 

Above the joys of youth. 

Of old, before the lamp greAv dark. 
Reposing near the curtain'd ark. 

The child of Hannah's prayer 
Heard, through the temple's silent round, 
A living voice, nor knew the sound, 
— That thrice alarm'd him, ere he found 

The Lord, who chose him there.* 

Thus early call'd, and strongly moved, 
A prophet from a child, approved, 

Spenxer his course began ; 
From strength to strength, from grace to grace, 
Swiftest and foremost in the race, 
He carried victory in his face ; 

He triumph'd as he ran. 




IN MEMORY OF REV. THOMAS SPENCER. 

How short his day ! — the glorious prize, 
To our slow hearts and failing eyes, 

Appear'd too quickly won : 
— The warrior rush'd into the field, 
With arm invincible to wield 
The Sprit's sword, the Spirit's shield. 

When, lo ! the fight was done. 

The loveliest star of evening's train 
Sets early in the western main. 

And leaves the world in night ; 
The brightest star of morning's host, 
Scarce risen, in brighter beams is lost ; 
Thus sunk his form on ocean's coast, 

Thus sprang his soul to light. 

Who shall forbid the eye to Aveep, 
That saw him, from the ravening deep, 

Pluck'd like the hon's prey ? 
For ever bow'd his honour'd head, 
The spirit in a moment fled, 
The heart of friendship cold and dead. 

The limbs a wreath of clay ! 

Revolving his mysterious lot, 

I mourn kim, but I praise him not ; 

Glory to God be given, 
Who sent him, like the radiant bow, 
His covenant of peace to show ; 
Athwart the breaking storm to glow, 

Then vanish into heaven. 

O Church ! to whom that youth was dear, 
The Angel of thy mercies here. 

Behold the path he trod, 
"A milky way" through midnight skies ! 
— Behold the grave in which he hes ; 
Even from this dust thy prophet cries, 

'■^Prepare to meet thy GOB.'''' 



L 



TRIBUTARY POEMS. 



THE CHRISTIAN SOLDIER. 

OCCASIONED BY THE SUDDEN DEATH OF 

THE REV. THOMAS TAYLOR, 

After having dftclared, in his last Sermon, on a preceding evening, that he hoped 
to die as an old soldier of Jesus Christ, with his sword in his hand. 



" Servant of God ! well done, 

Rest from thy loved employ ; 
The battle fought, the victory Avon, 

Enter thy Master's joy." 
— The voice at midnight came ; 

He started up to hear : 
A mortal arrow pierced his frame, 

He fell,— but felt no fear. 

Tranquil amidst alarms, 

It found him in the field, 
A veteran slumbering on his arms. 

Beneath his red-cross shield : 
His sword was in his hand, 

Still warm with recent fight. 
Ready that moment at command. 

Through rock and steel to smite. 

It was a two-edged blade 

Of heavenly temper keen ; 
And double were the wounds it made, 

Where'er it smote between : 
'Twas death to sin ; — 'twas life 

To all that mouni'd for sin ; 
It kindled and it silenced strife, 

Made war and peace within. 

Oft with its fiery force. 

His arm had quell'd the foe, 

And laid, resistless in his course. 
The alien-armies low : 



A RECOLLECTION OF MARY F. 



Bent on such glorious toils. 

The world to him was loss ; 
Yet all his trophies, all his spoils, 

He hung upon the cross. 

At midnight came the cry, 

" To meet thy God prepare !" 
He wolce, and caught his Captain's eye ; 

Then strong in failh and prayer, 
His spirit, with a bound. 

Bursts its encumbering clay : 
His tent, at sunrise, on the ground, 

A darken'd ruin lay. 

The pains of death are past. 

Labour and sorrow cease. 
And hfe's long warfare closed at last. 

His soul is found in peace. 
Soldier of Christ ! well done ; 

Praise be thy new employ ; 
And while eternal ages run. 

Rest in thy Saviour's joy. 



A RECOLLECTION OF MARY F., 

A YOUNG LADY UNEXPECTEDLY REMOVED FROJI A LARGE FAMILY CIRCLE. 

Her life had twice been saved, once from the flames, and again from the water, 
by an affectionate father. 

Thrice born for earth and twice for heaven, 

A lovely maiden once I knew. 
To whom 'tis now in glory given 

To grow, as here in shade she grew ; 
Brief was her course, but starry bright ; 
The hnnet's song, the hly's white. 
The fountain's freshness, — these shall be 
Meet emblems of that maid to me. 




A weeping babe to light she came, 

And changed for smiles a mother's throes ; 
In childhood from devouring flame, 
Rescued, to second life she rose ; 
A father's arm had pluck'd her thence ; 
That arm again was her defence, 
When buried in the strangling wave, 
He snatch'd her from an ocean grave. 

Twice born for heaven as thrice for earth, 

When God's eternal Spirit moved 
On lier young heart, a nobler birth 

Than nature can confer, she proved : 
— The dew-drop in the breeze of morn, 
Trembling and sparkling on the thorn. 
Falls to the ground, escapes the eye. 
Yet mounts on sunbeams to the sky. 

Thus in the dcAv of youth she shone, 

Thus in the morn of beauty fell ; 
Even while we gazed, the form was gone, 

Her life became invisible ; 
Her last best birth, with her last breath, 
Came in the dark disguise of death ; 
Grief fill'd her parents' home of love, 
But joy her Father's house above. 



IN MEMORY OF E. B. 



FORMERLY E. R. 



Hers was a soul of fire that burn'd 

Too soon for tis, its earthly tent. 
But not too soon for her return'd 

To Him from whom it first was sent : 
Grave ! keep the ashes, till, redeem'd from thee, 
This mortal puts on immortality. 



IN MEMORY OF E. G. 



Hers was a frame so frail, so fiae, 

The soul was seen through every part, 

A light that could not choose but shine 
In eye and utterance, hand and heart ; 

That soul rests now, till God, in his great day. 

Remoulds his image from this perish'd clay. 

Body and soul, eternally. 

No more conflicting nor estranged, 
One saint made perfect then shall be. 

From glory into glory changed ; 
This was her hope in hfe, in death ; — may I 
Live hke the righteous, hke the righteous die. 



IN MEMORY OF E. G. 

Soft be the turf on thy dear breast, 
And heavenly calm thy lone retreat ; 

How long'd the wearied frame for rest ; 
That rest is come, and oh how sweet ! 

There's nothing terrible in death ; 

'Tis but to cast our robes away, 
And sleep at night, without a breath 

To break repose till dawn of day. 

'Tis not a night without a morn, 

Though glooms impregnable surround ; 

Nor lies the buried corse forlorn, 
A hopeless prisoner in the ground. 

The darkest clouds give lightnings birth, 
The pearl is form'd in ocean's bed ; 

The gem, unperishing in earth. 

Springs from its grave as from the dead. 

So shall the relics of the just ; 

In weakness sown, but raised in power, 




The precious seed shall leave the dust, 
A glorious and immortal flower. 

But art thou dead ? — must we deplore 
Joys gone for ever from our lot ? 

And shall we see thy face no more, 
Where all reminds us — thou art not ? 

No, — live while those who love thee live. 
The sainted sister of our heart ; 

And thought to thee a form shall give 
Of all thou wast, and all thou art :— 

Of all thou wast, when from thine eyes 
The latest beams of kindness shone ; 

Of all thou art, when faith descries 
Thy spirit bow'd before the throne? 



M. S. 

TO THE MEMORY OF 

"a female whom sickness had eeconciled to the notes of 

SORROW," 

Who corresponded with the Author under this signature, on the first publication 
of his Poems, in 1806, but died soon after; when her real name and merits 
were disclosed to him by one of her surviving friends. 

My Song of Sorrow reach' d her ear ; 
She raised her languid head to hear, 
And, smiling in the arms of Death, 
Consoled me with her latest breath. 
What is the Poet's highest aim. 
His richest heritage of fame ? 
— To track the Avarrior's fiery road. 
With havoc, spoil, destruction strew'd. 
While nations bleed along the plains, 
Dragg'd at his chariot-wheels in chains ? 



— With fawning hand to woo the lyre, 
Profanely steal celestial fire, 
And bid an idol's altar blaze 
With incense of unhaUow'd praise ? 
— W"ith syren strains, Circean art, 
To win the ear, beguile the heart. 
Wake the wild passions into rage. 
And please and prostitute the age ? 

NO ! — to the generous bard belong 
Diviner themes and purer song : 
— To hail Religion from above. 
Descending in the form of Love, 
And pointing through a world of strife 
The narrow way that leads to life : 
— To pour the balm of heavenly rest 
Through Sorrow's agonizing breast ; 
With Pity's tender arms embrace 
The orphans of a kindred race ; 
And in one zone of concord bind 
The lawless spoilers of mankind : 
— To sing in numbers boldly free 
The wars and woes of liberty ; 
The glory of her triumphs tell, 
Her noble suffering when she fell,* 
Girt with the phalanx of the brave. 
Or Avidow'd on the patriot's grave. 
Which tyrants tremble to pass by. 
Even on the car of Victory. 

These are the Bard's sublimest views, 
The angel-visions of the Muse, 
That o'er his morning slumbers shine ; 
These are his themes, — and these were mine. 
But pale Despondency, that stole 
The light of gladness from my soul. 
While youth and folly blindfold ran 
The giddy circle up to Man, 

* "Piu val d'ogni vittoria un bel soffrire." 

Gaetana Passerini. 




Breathed a dark spirit through my lyre, 
Dimm'd the noon-radiance of my fire, 
And cast a mournful evening' hue 
O'er every scene my fancy drew. 
Then though the proud despised. my strain, 
It flow'd not from my heart in vain ; 
The lay of freedom, fervour, truth, 
Was dear to undissembling youth, 
From manly breasts drew generous sighs. 
And Virtue's tears from Beauty's eyes. 

My Song of Sorrow reach'd HER ear ; 
She raised her languid head to hear. 
And, smiling in the arms of Death, 
She bless'd me with her latest breath. 

A secret hand to me convey'd 
The thoughts of that inspiring Maid ; 
They came like voices on the wind. 
Heard in the stillness of the mind. 
When round the Poet's twilight Avalk 
Aerial beings seem to talk : 
Not the twin-stars of Leda shine 
With vernal influence more benign. 
Nor sweeter, in the sylvan vale, 
Sings the lone-warbling nightingale, 
Than through my shades her lustre broke. 
Than to my griefs her spirit spoke. 

My fancy form'd her young and fair, 
Pure as her sister-lihes were, 
Adorn'd with meekest maiden grace. 
With every charm of soul and face, 
That Virtue's awful eye approves, 
And fond Affection dearly loves : 
Heaven in her open aspect seen. 
Her Maker's image in her mien. 

Such was the picture fancy drew, 
In hneaments divinely true ; 
The Muse, by her mysterious art, 
Had shown her likeness to my heart, 




And every faithful feature brought 
O'er the clear mirror of my thought. 
But she was waning to the tomb ; 
The worm of death was in her bloom ; 
— Yet as the mortal frame declined, 
Strong through the ruins rose the mind ; 
As the dim moon, when night ascends, 
Slow in the east the darkness rends, 
Through melting clouds, by gradual gleams. 
Pours the mild splendour of her beams. 
Then bursts in triumph o'er the pole, 
Free as a disembodied soul ! 
Thus, while the veil of flesh decay'd. 
Her beauties brighten'd through the shade ; 
Charms which her lowly heart conceal'd, 
In nature's weakness Avere revealed 
And still the unrobing spirit cast 
Diviner glories to the last. 
Dissolved its bonds, and clear'd its flight, 
Emerging into perfect light. 

Yet shall the friends who loved her weep. 
Though shrined in peace the suflferer sleep. 
Though rapt to heaven the saint aspire. 
With seraph guards on wings of fire ; 
Yet shall they weep ; — for oft and weU 
Remembrance shall her story tell. 
Affection of her virtues speak. 
With beaming eye and burning cheek, 
Each action, word, and look recall. 
The last, the loveliest of all. 
When on the lap of death she lay. 
Serenely smiled her soul away. 
And left surviving Friendship's breast 
Warm with the sunset of her rest. 

O thou, who wert on earth unknown, 
Companion of my thought alone ! 
Unchanged in heaven to me thou art. 
Still hold communion with my heart ; 



TRIBUTARY POEMS. 



Cheer thou my hopes, exalt my views, 
Be the good angel of my Muse ; 
— And if to thine approving ear 
My plaintive numbers once were dear ; 
If, falling round thy dying hours. 
Like evening dews on closing flowers. 
They soothed thy pains, and through thy soul 
With melancholy sweetness stole, 
HEAR ME : — ^\Vhen slumber from mine eyes, 
That roll in irksome darkness, flies ; 
When the lorn spectre of unrest 
At conscious midnight haunts my breast ; 
When former joys and present woes. 
And future fears^ are all my foes ; 
Spirit of my departed friend. 
Calm through the troubled gloom descend. 
With strains of triumph on thy tongue. 
Such as to dying saints are sung ; 
Such as in Paradise the ear 
Of God himself delights to hear ; 
— Come, all unseen ; be only known 
By Zion's harp of higher tone, 
Warbling to thy mj^sterious voice ; 
Bid my desponding powers rejoice : 
And I will listen to thy lay, 
Till night and sorrow flee away. 
Till gladness o'er my bosom rise, 
And morning kindle round the skies. 
If thus to me, sweet saint, be given 
To learn from thee the hymns of heaven. 
Thine inspiration will impart 
Seraphic ardours to my heart ; 
My voice thy music shall prolong, 
And echo thy entrancing song ; 
My lyre with sympathy divine 
Shall answer every chord of thine. 
Till their consenting tones give birth 
To harmonies unknown on earth. 



ON THE ROYAL INFANT. 193 

Then shall my thoughts, in Hving fire 
Sent down from heaven, to heaven aspire, 
My verse through lofty measures rise, 
A scale of glory, to the skies, 
Resembhng, on each hallow'd theme, 
The ladder of the Patriarch's dream. 
O'er which descending angels shone. 
On earthly missions from the throne, 
Returning by the steps they trod, 
Up to the Paradise of God. 



ON THE ROYAL INFANT, 

STILL-BORN; NOV. 5, 131T. 

A THRONE on earth awaited thee ; 

A nation long'd to see thy face, 
Heir to a glorious ancestry, 

And father of a mightier race. 

Vain hope ! that throne thou must not fill ; 

Thee may that nation ne'er behold ; 
Thine ancient house is heirless still, 

Thy Hne shall never be unroll'd. 

Yet while we mourn thy flight from earth. 

Thine was a destiny sublime ; 
Caught up to Paradise in birth, 

Pluck'd by Eternity from Time. 

The Mother knew her offspring dead : 
Oh ! was it grief, or was it love 

That broke her heart ? — The spirit fled 
To seek her nameless child above. 

Led by his natal star, she trod 

The path to heaven : — the meeting there, 
And how they stood before their God, 

The day of judgment shall declare. 



TRIBUTARY POEMS. 



A MOTHER'S LAMENT 

ON THE DEATH OF HER INFANT DAUGHTER. 

I LOVED thee, Daughter of my heart ; 

My Child, I loved thee dearly ; 
And though Ave only met to part, 

— How sweetly ! how severely ! — 
Nor life nor death can sever 
My soul from thine for ever. 

Thy days, my little one, were few, — 

An Angel's morning visit. 
That came and vanish'd with the dew : 

'Twas here, 'tis gone, where is it ? 
Yet didst thou leave behind thee 
A clew for love to find thee. 

The eye, the lip, the cheek, the brow, 
The hands stretch'd forth in gladness, 

All life, joy, rapture, beauty now. 
Then dash'd with infant sadness. 

Till, brightening by transition, 

Return'd the fairy vision : — 

Where are they now ? — those smiles, those tears, 

Thy Mother's darling treasure ? 
She sees them still, and still she hears 

Thy tones of pain or pleasure. 
To her quick pulse revealing 
Unutterable feeling. 

Hush'd in a moment on her breast. 

Life, at the well-spring drinking, 
Then cradled on her lap to rest, 

In rosy slumber sinking, 
Thy dreams — no thought can guess them ; 
And mine — no tongue express them. 



THE WIDOW AND THE FATHERLESS. 



For then this waking eye could see, 

In many a vain vagary, 
The things that never were to be, 

Imaginations airy ; 
Fond hopes that mothers cherish. 
Like still-born babes to perish. 

Mine perish'd on thy early bier ; 

No — changed to forms more glorious, 
They flourish in a higher sphere, 

O'er time and death victorious ; 
Yet would these arms have chain'd thee. 
And long from heaven detain'd thee. 

Sarah ! my last, my youngest love. 

The crown of every other ! 
Though thou art born in heaven above, 

I am thine only Mother, 
Nor will affection let me 
Believe thou canst forget me. 

Then, — thou in heaven and I on earth, — 
May this one hope delight us, 

That thou wilt hail my second birth 
When death shall re-unite us. 

Where worlds no more can sever 

Parent and child for ever. 



THE WIDOW AND THE FATHERLESS. 

Well, thou art gone, and I am left ; 

But, oh ! how cold and dark to me 
This world, of every charm bereft, 

Where all was beautiful with thee ! 

Though I have seen thy form depart 
For ever from my widow'd eye, 

I hold thee in my inmost heart ; 

There, there at least, thou canst not die. 



1« TRIBUTARY POEMS. 



Farewell on earth ; Heaven claim'd its own ; 

Yet, when from me thy presence went, 
I was exchanged for God alone : 

Let dust and ashes learn content. 

Ha ! those small voices silver-sweet 

Fresh from the fields my babes appear ; 

They fill my arms, they clasp my feet ; 
— " Oh ! could your father see us here !" 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



THE LYRE. 



" Ah ! who would love the lyre !" 

W. B. Stevens. 



Where the roving rill meander'd 

Down the green retiring vale, 
Poor, forlorn Alceus Avander'd, 

Pale with thought, serenely pale : 
Timeless sorrow o'er his face 
Breathed a melancholy grace. 
And fix'd on every feature there 
The mournful resignation of despair. 

O'er his arm, his lyre neglected, 

Once his dear companion, hung, 
And, in spirit deep dejected, 

Thus the pensive poet sung; 
While at midnight's solemn noon. 
Sweetly shone the cloudless moon. 
And all the stars, around his head. 
Benignly bright, their mildest influence shed. 

" Lyre ! O Lyre ! my chosen treasure, 

Solace of my bleeding heart ; 

Lyre ! O Lyre ! my only pleasure 

We must now for ever part ; 
For in vain thy poet sings. 
Wooes in vain thine heavenly strings ; 
The Muse's wretched sons are born 
To cold neglect, and penury, and scorn. 




"That which Alexander sigh'd for, 
That which Cesar's soul possess'd, 
That which heroes, kings, have died for — 

Glory ! — animates my breast : 
Hark ! the charging trumpets' throats 
Pour their death-defying notes ; 
' To arms !' they call : to arms I fly, 
Like Wolfe to conquer, and hke Wolfe to die. 

" Soft ! — tlie blood of murder'd legions 
Summons vengeance from the skies ; 
Flaming towns and ravaged regions, 
All in aAvful judgment rise. — 

then, innocently brave, 

1 will wrestle with the Avave ; 

Lo ! Commerce spreads the daring sail, 
And yokes her naval chariots to the gale. 

" Blow, ye breezes ! — gently blowing, 

Waft me to that happy shore. 

Where, from fountains ever flowing, 

Indian realms their treasures pour; 
Thence returning, poor in health. 
Rich in honesty and wealth. 
O'er thee, my dear paternal soil, 
I'll strew the golden harvest of my toil. 

" Then shall Misery's sons and daughters 
In their lowly dwelHngs sing : 
Bounteous as the Nile's dark waters, 

Undiscover'd as their spring, 
I will scatter o'er the land 
Blessings with a secret hand ; 
For such angelic tasks design'd, 
I give the lyre and sorrow to the wind." 

On an oak, whose branches hoary 

Sigh'd to every passing breeze, 
Sigh'd and told the simple story 

Of the patriarch of trees ; 



THE LYRE. 



High in air his harp he hung, 
Now no more to rapture strung ; 
Then warm in hope, no longer pale, 
He blush'd adieu, and rambled down the dale. 

Lightly touch'd by fairy fingers, 

Hark ! — the Lyre enchants the wind ; 
Fond Algous listens, lingers 

— Lingering, listening, looks behind. 
Now the music mounts on high. 
Sweetly swelling through the sky ; 
To every tone, with tender heat. 
His heart-strings vibrate, and his pulses beat. 

Now the strains to silence steahng. 

Soft in ecstasies expire ; 
Oh ! with what romantic feeling 
Poor Alc^us grasps the Lyre. 
Lo ! his furious hand he flings 
In a tempest o'er the strings ; 
He strikes the chords so quick, so loud, 
'Tis Jove that scatters lightning from a cloud. 

" Lyre ! O Lyre ! my chosen treasure, 

Solace of my bleeding heart ; 

Lyre ! O Lyre ! my only pleasure. 

We will never, never part : 
Glory, Commerce, now in vain 
Tempt me to the field, the main ; 
The Muse's sons are blest, though bom 
To cold neglect, and penury, and scorn. 
" What, though all the world neglect me, 
Shall my haughty soul repine ? 
And shall poverty deject me. 

While this hallow'd Lyre is mine ? 
Heaven — that o'er my helpless head 
Many a wrathful vial shed, — 
Heaven gave this Lyre, — and thus decreed. 
Be thou a bruised, but not a broken reed." 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



REMONSTRANCE TO WINTER. 

Ah ! why, unfeecling Winter, why- 
Still flags thy torpid wing? 

Fly, melancholy Season, fly. 
And yield the year to Spring. 

Spring, — the young harbinger of love, 

An exile in disgrace, — 
Flits o'er the scene, like Noah's dove. 

Nor finds a resting place. 

When on the mountain's azure peak 

Alights her fairy form. 
Cold blow the winds, — and dark and bleak 

Around her rolls the storm. 
If to the valley she repair 

For shelter and defence. 
Thy wrath pursues the mourner there, 

And drives her, weeping, thence. 

She seeks the brook, the faithless brook, 

Of her unmindful grown. 
Feels the chill magic of thy look, 

And lingers into stone. 

She wooes her embryo-flowers in vain 

To rear their infant heads ; — 
Deaf to her voice, her flowers remain 

Enchanted in their beds. 
In vain she bids the trees expand 

Their green luxuriant charms ; — 
Bare in the wilderness they stand. 

And stretch their withering arms. 

Her favourite birds, in feeble notes. 

Lament thy long delay ; 
And strain their little stammering throats 

To charm thy blasts away. 



ROUND love's ELYSIAN BOWERS. 



Ah ! Winter, calm thy cruel rage, 
Release the struggling year ; 

Thy power is past, decrepit Sage, 
Arise and disappear. 

The stars that graced thy splendid night 

Are lost in warmer rays ; 
The Sun, rejoicing in his might, 

Unrolls celestial days. 

Then why, usurping Winter, why 

Still flags thy frozen wing ? 
Fly, unrelenting tyrant, fly — 

And yield the year to Spring. 



ROUND LOVE'S ELYSIAN BOWERS. 

Round Love's Elysian bowers 

The fairest prospects rise ; 
There bloom the sweetest flowers, 
There shine the purest skies : 
And joy and rapture gild awhile 
The cloudless heaven of Beauty's smile. 

Round Love's deserted bowers 

Tremendous rocks arise ; 
Cold mildews blight the flowers, 
Tornadoes rend the skies : 
And Pleasure's waning moon goes down 
Amid the night of Beauty's frown. 

Then Youth, thou fond believer ! 

The wily Syren shun ; 
Who trusts the dear deceiver 
Will surely be undone : 
When Beauty triumphs, ah ! beware ; — 
Her smile is hope — her frown despair. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



LINES 

WRITTEN UNDER 

A DRAWING OF YARDLEY OAK, 

CELEBRATED BY COWPER. 
See JlayUifs Life and Letters of W. Cowper, Esq. 

This sole survivor of a race 

Of giant oaks, where once the wood 
Rang with the battle or the chase, 

In stern and lonely grandeur stood. 

From age to age it slowly spread 
Its gradual boughs to sun and wind ; 

From age to age its noble head 
As slowly wither'd and declined. 

A thousand years are like a day, 

When fled ; — no longer known than seen ; 
This tree was doom'd to pass away. 

And be as if it ne'er had been ; — 

But mournful Cowper, wandering nigh, 
For rest beneath its shadow came, 

When, lo ! the voice of days gone by 
Ascended from its hollow frame. 

O that the Poet had reveal'd 

The words of those prophetic strains. 
Ere death the eternal mystery seal'd 

Yet in his song the Oak remains. 

And fresh in undecaying prime, 

T7iere may it live, beyond the power 

Of storm and earthquake, Man and Time, 
Till Nature's conflagration-hour. 



FRIENDSHIP, LOVE, AND TRUTH. 



WRITTEN FOR A SOCIETY, 

WHOSE MOTTO WAS "FRIENDSHIP, LOVE, AND TRUTH." 

When "Friendship, Love, and Truth" abound 
I Anriong a band of Brothers, 

The cup of joy goes gaily round. 

Each shares the bliss of others : 

Sweet roses grace the thorny way 

Along this vale of sorrow ; 
The flowers that shed their leaves to-day 
Shall bloom again to-morrow : 
How grand in age, how fair in youth. 
Are holy " Friendship, Love, and Truth 1" 

On halcyon wings our moments pass. 

Life's cruel cares beguiUng ; 
Old Time lays down his scythe and glass. 

In gay good-humour smiling : 
With ermine beard and forelock gray. 

His reverend front adorning, 
He looks like Winter turn'd to May, 

Night soften'd into morning. 
How grand in age, how fair in youth, 
Are holy " Friendship, Love, and Truth !" 

From these delightful fountains flow 

Ambrosial rills of pleasure : 
Can man desire, can Heaven bestow 

A more resplendent treasure ? 
Adorn'd with gems so richly bright, 

We'll form a Constellation, 
Where every Star, with modest light, 

Shall gild his proper station. 
How grand in age, how fair in youth, 
Are holy " Friendship, Love, and Truth !" 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



RELIGION. 



AN OCCASIONAI, HTMX. 



Through shades and solitudes profound 
The fainting traveller winds his way ; 

Bewildering meteors glare around, 
And tempt his wandering feet astray. 

Welcome, thrice welcome, to his eye 
The sudden moon's inspiring light, 

When forth she sallies through the sky, 
The guardian angel of the night. 

Thus mortals. Wind and weak, below 
Pursue the phantom Bhss, in vain ; 

The world's a pilgrimage of wo. 
And life a pilgrimage of pain. 

Till mild Religion, from above. 

Descends, a sweet engaging form — 

The messenger of heavenly love. 
The bow of promise in a storm. 

Then guilty passions wing their flight, 
Sorrow, remorse, affliction cease ; 

Religion's yoke is soft and light, 
And all her paths are paths of peace. 

Ambition, pride, revenge depart, 
And folly flies her chastening rod ; 

She makes the humble contrite heart 
A temple of the living God. 

Beyond the narrow vale of time. 
Where bright celestial ages roll. 

To scenes eternal, scenes sublime. 

She points the way, and leads the soul. 



At her approach the Grave appears 
The Gate of Paradise restored ; 

Her voice the watching Cherub hears, 
And drops his double-flaming sword. 

Baptized with her renewing fire, 
May we the crown of glory gain ; 

Rise when the Host of Heaven expire, 
And reign with God, for ever reign ! 



THE JOY OF GRIEF. 

Sweet the hour of tribulation. 
When the heart can freely sigh. 

And the tear of resignation 
Twinkles in the mournful eye. 

Have you felt a kind emotion 

Tremble through your troubled breast ; 
Soft as evening o'er the ocean. 

When she charms the waves to rest ? 

Have you lost a friend, or brother ? 

Heard a father's parting breath ? 
Gazed upon a lifeless mother. 

Till she seem'd to wake from death ? 

Have you felt a spouse expiring 
In your arms before your view ? 

Watch'd the lovely soul retiring 
From her eyes that broke on you ? 

Did not grief then grow romantic, 
Raving on remember' d bliss ? 

Did you not, with fervour frantic. 
Kiss the lips that felt no kiss ? 

Yes ! but when you had resign'd her, 
Life and you were reconciled ; 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



Anna left — she left behind her, 
One, one dear, one only child. 

But before the green moss peeping. 
His poor mother's grave array'd, 

In that grave the infant sleeping 
On the mother's lap was laid. 

Horror then, your heart congealing, 
Chill'd you with intense despair : 

Can you call to mind the feeling ? 
No ! there was no feeling there. 

From that gloomy trance of sorrow. 
When you woke to pangs unknown, 

How unwelcome was the morrow. 
For it rose on you alone ! 

Sunk in self-consuming anguish, 
Can the poor heart always ache ? 

No, the tortured nerve will languish, 
Or the strings of life must break. 

O'er the yielding brow of Sadness 
One faint smile of comfort stole ; 

One soft pang of tender gladness 
Exquisitely thrill'd your soul. 

While the wounds of wo are healing. 
While the heart is all resign'd ; 

'Tis the solemn feast of feeling, 
'Tis the sabbath of the mind. 

Pensive memory then retraces 
Scenes of bhss for ever fled. 

Lives in former times and places. 
Holds communion with the dead. 

And when night's prophetic slumbers 
Rend the veil to mortal eyes. 

From their tombs the sainted numbers 
Of our lost companions rise. 



THE BATTLE OF ALEXANDRIA. 



You have seen a friend, a brother, 

Heard a dear dead father speak ; 
Proved the fondness of a mother, 

Felt her tears upon your cheek. 
Dreams of love your grief beguiling, 

You have clasp'd a consort's charms, 
And received your infant smiUng 

From his mother's sacred arn&s. 

Trembling, pale, and agonizing, 

While you mourn'd the vision gone, 

Bright the morning-star arising, 

Open'd heaven, from whence it shone. 

Thither all your wishes bending. 

Rose in ecstasy sublime, 
Thither all your hopes ascending 

Triumph'd over death and time. 
Thus afflicted, bruised, and broken. 

Have you known such sweet relief? 
Yes, my friend ; and by this token, 

You have felt " the joy of grief." 



THE BATTLE OF ALEXANDRIA. 

At Thebes, in Ancient Eeypt, was erected a statue of Memnon, with a harp in 
his hand, which is said to have hailed with delightful music the rising sun, and 
in melancholy tones to have mourned his departure. The introduction of this 
celebrated Lyre, on a modern occasion, will be censured as an anachronism by 
those only who think that its chords have been touch'd unskilfully. 

Harp of Memnon ! sweetly strung 

To the music of the spheres ; 
While the Hero's dirge is sung, 

Breathe enchantment to our ears. 

As the Sun's descending beams, 

Glancing o'er thy feeling wire. 
Kindle every chord that gleams. 

Like a ray of heavenly fire : 




Let thy numbers, soft and slow, 

O'er the plain Avith carnage spread. 
Soothe the dying while they flow 

To the memory of the dead. 
Bright as Beauty, newly born. 

Blushing at her maiden charms ; 
Fresh from Ocean rose the Morn, 

When the trumpet blew to arms. 

Terrible soon grew the light 
On the Egyptian battle-plain, 

As the darkness of that night. 
When the eldest born was slain. 

Lash'd to madness by the Avind, 

As the Red Sea surges roar. 
Leave a gloomy gulf behind, 

And devour the shrinking shore ; 

Thus, with overwhelming pride, 

Gallia's brightest, boldest boast, 
In a deep -and dreadful tide, 

RoU'd upon the British host. 
Dauntless these their station held, 

Though with unextinguish'd ire 
Gallia's legions, thrice repell'd. 

Thrice return'd through blood and fire. 
Thus, above the storms of time. 

Towering to the sacred spheres, 
Stand the Pyramids sublime, — 

Rocks amid the flood of years. 
Now the veteran Chief drew nigh, 

Conquest towering on his crest, 
Valour beaming from his eye. 

Pity bleeding in his breast. 

Britain saw him thus advance 
In her Guardian-Angel's form ; 

But he lower'd on hostile France, 
Like the Demon of the Storm. 



I 



THE BATTLE OF ALEXANDRIA. 209 



On the whirlwind of the war 
High he rode in vengeance dire ; 

To his friends a leading star, 
To his foes consuming fire. 

Then the mighty pour'd their breath, 
Slaughter feasted on the brave ! 

'Tvvas the Carnival of Death ; 
'Twas the Vintage of the Grave. 

Charged with Abercrombie's doom, 
Lightning wing'd a cruel ball : 

'Twas the Herald of the Tomb, 
And the Hero felt the call — 

Felt — and raised his arm on high ; 

Victory well the signal knew, 
Darted from his awful eye, 

And the force of France o'erthrew. 

But the horrors of that fight, 

Were the weeping Muse to tell, 
Oh 'twould cleave the womb of night, 
•And awake the dead that fell ! 

Gash'd with honourable scars. 
Low in Glory's lap they lie ; 

Though they fell, they fell hke stars. 
Streaming splendour through the sky. 

Yet shall Memory mourn that day, 

When, with expectation pale. 
Of her soldier far away 

The poor widow hears the tale. 
In imagination wild. 

She shall wander o'er this plain. 
Rave, — and bid her orphan-child 

Seek his sire among the slain. 

Gently, from the western deep, 
O ye evening breezes, rise ! 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



O'er the Lyre of Memnon sweep, 
Wake its spirit with your sighs. 

Harp of Memnon ! sweetly strung 
To the music of the spheres ; 

While the Hero's dirge is sung, 
Breathe enchantment to our ears. 

Let thy numbers soft and slow 

O'er the plain with carnage spread, 

Soothe the dying while they flow 
To the memory of the dead. 

None but solemn, tender tones 

Tremble from thy plaintive wires : 

Hark ! the wounded Warrior groans : 
Hush thy warbling ! — he expires. 

Hush ! — while Sorrow wakes and weeps 
O'er his relics cold and pale. 

Night her silent vigil keeps, 
In a mournful moonhght vale. 

Harp of Memnon ! from afar, 

Ere the lark salute the sky. 
Watch the rising of the star 

That proclaims the morning nigh. 

Soon the Sun's ascending rays. 

In a flood of hallow'd fire, 
O'er thy kindhng chords shall blaze, 

And thy magic soul inspire. 
Then thy tones triumphant pour, 

Let them pierce the Hero's grave ; 
Life's tumultuous battle o'er. 

Oh how sweetly sleep the brave ! 

From the dust their laurels bloom. 
High they shoot and flourish free ; 

Glory's Temple is the tomb ; 
Death is immortality. 



THE PILLOW. 



THE PILLOW 

The head that oft this Pillow press'd, 
That aching head, is gone to rest ; 
Its little pleasures now no more, 
And all its mighty sorrows o'er. 
For ever, in the worm's dark bed, 
For ever sleeps that humble head ! 

My friend was young, the world was new; 
The world was false, my friend was true ; 
Lowly his lot, his birth obscure. 
His fortune hard, my'' friend was poor ; 
To wisdom he had no pretence, 
A child of suffering, not of sense ; 
For Nature never did impart 
A weaker or a warmer heart. 
His fervent soul, a soul of flame, 
Consumed its frail terrestrial frame ; 
That fire from Heaven so fiercely burn'd, 
That whence it came it soon return'd : 
And yet, O Pillow ! yet to me. 
My gentle Friend survives in thee ; 
In thee, the partner of his bed. 
In thee, the widow of the dead. 

On Helicon's inspiring brink. 
Ere yet my friend had learn'd to think, 
Once as he pass'd the careless day 
Among the whispering reeds at play. 
The Muse of Sorrow wander'd by ; 
Her pensive beauty fix'd his eye ; 
With sweet astonishment he smiled ; 
The Gipsy saw — she stole the child ; 
And soft on her ambrosial breast 
Sang the delighted babe to rest ; 
Convey'd him to her inmost grove, 
A.nd loved him with a Mother's love. 



MISCELLANKOUS POEMS. 



Awaking from his rosy nap, 
And gaily sporting on her lap, 
His wanton fingers o'er her lyre 
Twinkled like electric fire : 
Q,uick and quicker as they flew, 
Sweet and sweeter tones they drew ; 
Now a bolder hand he flings. 
And dives among the deepest strings ; 
Then forth the music brake hke thunder ; 
Back he started, wild with wonder. 
The Muse of Sorrow wept for joy. 
And clasp'd and kiss'd her chosen boy. 

Ah ! then no more his smiling hours 
Were spent in Childhood's Eden-bowers ; 
The fall from Infant-innocence, 
The fall to knowledge drives us thence : 
O Knowledge ! worthless at the price. 
Bought with the loss of Paradise. 
As happy ignorance dechned. 
And reason rose upon his mind. 
Romantic hopes and fond desires 
(Sparks of the soul's immortal fires) 
Kindled within his breast the rage 
To breathe through every future age. 
To clasp the flitting shade of fame. 
To build an everlasting name, 
O'erleap the narrow vulgar span, 
And live beyond the life of man. 

Then Nature's charms his heart possess'd, 
And Nature's glory fill'd his breast : 
The sweet Spring-morning's infant rays, 
Meridian Summer's youthful blaze, 
Maturer Autumn's evening mild, 
And hoary Winter's midnight wild, 
Awoke his eye, inspired his tongue ; 
For every scene he loved, he sung. 
Rude were his songs, and simple truth, 
Till Boyhood blossom'd into Youth ; 



THE PILLOW. 

Then nobler themes his fancy fired, 

To bolder flights his soul aspired ; 

And as the new moon's opening eye 

Broadens and brightens through the sky, 

From the dim streak of western light 

To the full orb that rules the night ; 

Thus, gathering lustre in its race. 

And shining through unbounded space, 

From earth to heaven his Genius soar'd, 

Time and eternity explored. 

And hail'd, where'er its footsteps trod. 

In Nature's temple. Nature's God : 

Or pierced the human breast to scan 

The hidden majesty of Man ; 

Man's hidden weakness too descried, 

His glory, grandeur, meanness, pride : 

Pursued along their erring course 

The streams of passion to their source ; 

Or in the mind's creation sought 

New stars of fancy, worlds of thought. 

— Yet still through all his strains would flow 

A tone of uncomplaining wo. 

Kind as the tear in Pity's eye. 

Soft as the slumbering Infant's sigh, 

So sweetly, exquisitely wild, 

It spake the Muse of Sorrow's child. 

O Pillow ! then, when light withdrew, 
To thee the fond enthusiast flew ; 
On thee, in pensive mood reclined. 
He pour'd his contemplative mind. 
Till o'er his eyes with mild control 
Sleep like a soft enchantment stole, 
Charm'd into life his airy schemes, 
And realized his waking dreams. 

Soon from those waking dreams he woke, 
The fairy spell of fancy broke ; 
In vain he breathed a soul of fire 
Through every chord that strung his lyre. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



No friendly echo cheer'd his tongue ; 
Amidst the wilderness he sung ; 
Louder and bolder bards were crown'd, 
Whose dissonance his music drown'd : 
The public ear, the public voice, 
Despised his song, denied his choice, 
Denied a name, — a life in death, 
Denied — a bubble and a breath. 

Stript of his fondest, dearest claim, 
And disinherited of fame, 
To thee, O Pillow ! thee alone, 
He made his silent anguish known ; 
His haughty spirit scorn'd the blow 
That laid his high ambition low ; 
But, ah ! his looks assumed in vain 
A cold, ineffable disdain. 
While deep he cherish'd in his breast 
The scorpion that consumed his rest. 

Yet other secret griefs had he, 
O Pillow ! only told to thee : 
Say, did not hopeless love intrude 
On his poor bosom's sohtude ? 
Perhaps on thy soft lap reclined. 
In dreams the cruel Fair was kind, 
That more intensely he might know 
The bitterness of waking wo. 

Whate'er those pangs from me conceal'd, 
To tliee in midnight groans reveal'd, 
They stung remembrance to despair : 
"A Avounded spirit who can bear !" 
Meanwhile disease, with slow decay, 
Moulder'd his feeble frame away ; 
And as his evening sun declined. 
The shadows deepen'd o'er his mind. 
What doubts and terrors then possess'd 
The dark dominion of his breast ! 
How did delirious fancy dwell 
On Madness, Suicide, and Hell ! 



TO THE VOLUNTEERS OF BRITAIN. 



There was on earth no Power to save : 

But, as he shudder'd o'er the grave, 

He saw from reahns of light descend 
The friend of him who has no friend, 
Religion ! — Her almighty breath 
Rebuked the winds and waves of death ; 
She bade the storm of frenzy cease. 
And smiled a calm, and whisper'd peace : 
Amidst that calm of sweet repose. 
To Heaven his gentle Spirit rose. 



ODE 

TO THE VOLUNTEERS OF BRITAIN 

ON THE PROSPECT OF INVASION. 

O FOR the death of those 

Who for their country die, 
Sink on her bosom to repose. 

And triumph where they lie ! 

How beautiful in death 

The Warrior's corse appears, 
Embalm'd by fond Affection's breath. 

And bathed in Woman's tears ! 

Their loveliest native earth 

Enshrines the fallen brave ; 
In the dear land that gave them birth 

They find their tranquil grave. 

But the wild waves shall sweep 

Britannia's foes away. 
And the blue monsters of the deep 

Be surfeited with prey. — 

No ! — they have 'scaped the waves, 
'Scaped the sea-monsters' maws; 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



They come ! but oh ! shall Gallic Slaves 
Give English Freemen laws ? 

By Alfred's Spirit, No ! 

— Ring, ring the loud alarms ; 
Ye drums, awake ! ye clarions, blow ! 

Ye heralds, shout "To arms !" 

To arms our Heroes fly ; 

And, leading on their lines, 
The British Banner in the sky, 

The star of conquest shines. 

The lowering battle forms 

Its terrible array ; 
Like clashing clouds in mountain-storms. 

That thunder on their way : — 

The rushing armies meet ; 

And while they pour their breath, 
The strong earth shudders at their feet, 

The day grows dim with death. 

— Ghosts of the mighty dead ! 

Your children's hearts inspire ; 
And while they on your ashes tread. 

Rekindle all your fire. 

The dead to life return ; 

Our Fathers' spirits rise ; 
— My brethren, in your breasts they bum, 

They sparkle in your eyes. 

Now launch upon the foe 

The lightning of your rage ; 
Strike, strike the assaihng giants low, 

The Titans of the age. 

They yield, — they break, — they fly ; 

The victory is won : 
Pursue ! they faint, — they fall, — they die 

Oh, stay ! the work is done. 



TO THE VOLUNTEERS OF BRITAIN. 



Spirit of Vengeance ! rest : 

Sweet Mercy cries, " Forbear !" 
She clasps the vanquish'd to her breast ; 

Thou wilt not pierce them there ? 

Thus vanish Britain's foes 

From her consuming eye ; 
But rich be the reward of those 

Who conquer, those who die. 

O'ershadowing laurels deck 

The living Hero's brows ; 
But loveher wreaths entwine his neck, 

— His children and his spouse. 

Exuhing o'er his lot, 

The dangers he has braved, 
He clasps the dear ones, hails the cot, 

Which his own valour saved. 

Daughters of Albion, weep : 

On this triumphant plain. 
Your fathers, husbands, brethren sleep, 

For you and freedom slain. 

Oh ! gently close the eye 

That loved to look on you ; 
Oh ! seal the lip whose earliest sigh, 

Whose latest breath was true : 

With knots of sweetest flowers 

Their winding-sheet perfume ; 
And wash their wounds with true-love showers, 

And dress them for the tomb. 

For beautiful in death 

The Warrior's corse appears, 
Embalm'd by fond Affection's breath. 

And bathed in Woman's tears. 



— Give me the death of those 
Who for their country die ; 



And oh ! be mine like their repose, 
When cold and low they he ! 

Their loveliest mother Earth 
Enshrines the fallen brave ; 

In her sweet lap Avho gave them birth 
They find their tranquil grave. 



THE VIGIL OF ST. MARK. 

Returning from their evening walk, 

On yonder ancient stile. 
In sweet, romantic, tender talk. 

Two lovers paused awhile : 

Edmund, the monarch of the dale, 
All conscious of his powers ; 

Ella, the lily of the vale. 

The rose of Auburn's bowers. 

In airy Love's delightful bands 

He held her heart in vain : 
The Nymph denied her willing hands 

To Hymen's awful chain. 

"Ah ! why," said he, " our bliss delay ? 

Mine Ella, why so cold ? 
Those who but love from day to day. 

From day to day grow old. 

" The bounding arrow cleaves the sky. 

Nor leaves a trace behind ; 
And single hves hke arrows fly, 

— They vanish through the wind. 

" In Wedlock's sweet endearing lot, 

Let us improve the scene. 
That some may be, when we are not. 

To tell — that we have been." 



THE VIGIL OF ST, MARK. 



" 'Tis now," replied the village Belle, 
" St. Mark's mysterious Eve ; 

And all that old traditions tell 
I tremblingly believe ; — 

" How, when the midnight signal tolls, 

Along the churchyard green 
A mournful train of sentenced souls 

In winding-sheets are seen. 

" The ghosts of all whom death shall doom 

Within the coming year, 
In pale procession walk the gloom, 

Amid the silence drear. 

" If Edmund, bold in conscious might. 

By love severely tried, 
Can brave the terrors of to-night, 

Ella will be his bride." 

She spake, — and, like the nimble fawn. 
From Edmund's presence fled : 

He sought, across the rural lawn. 
The dwelling of the dead ; — 

That silent, solemn, simple spot, 
The mouldering realm of peace, 

Where human passions are forgot, 
Where human follies cease. 

The gliding moon through heaven serene 

Pursued her tranquil way. 
And shed o'er all the sleeping scene 

A soft nocturnal day. 

With sweUing heart and eager feet 
Young Edmund gain'd the church, 

And chose his soHtary seat 
Within the dreadful porch. 




Thick, threatening clouds assembled soon, 
Their dragon wings display'd ; 

Eclipsed the slow retiring moon, 
And quench'd the stars in shade. 

Amid the deep abyss of gloom 

No ray of beauty smiled, 
Save, glistening o'er some haunted tomb. 

The glow-worm's lustre wild. 

The village watch-dogs bay'd around, 
The long grass whistled drear, 

The steeple trembled to the ground, 
Ev'n Edmund quaked with fear. 

All on a sudden died the blast. 

Dumb horror chill'd the air, 
While Nature seem'd to pause aghast. 

In uttermost despair. 

— Twelve times the midnight herald toU'd, 

As oft did Edmund start ; 
For every stroke fell dead and cold 

Upon his fainting heart. 

Then glaring through the ghastly gloom. 

Along the churchyard green. 
The destined victims of the tomb 

In winding-sheets were seen. 

In that strange moment Edmund stood. 

Sick with severe surprise ! 
While creeping horror drank his blood. 

And fix'd his flinty eyes. 

He saw the secrets of the grave ; 

He saw the face of DEATH : 
No pitying power appear'd to save — 

He gasp'd away bis breath. 



THE VIGIL OF ST. MARK. 



Yet Still the scene his soul beguiled, 

And every spectre cast 
A look, unutterably wild. 

On Edmund as they pass'd. 

All on the ground entranced he lay ; 

At length the vision broke : 
— When, lo ! — a kiss, as cold as clay. 

The slumbering youth awoke. 

That moment through a rifted cloud. 

The darting moon display'd, 
Robed in a melancholy shroud, 

The image of a maid. 

Her dusky veil aside she drew. 

And show'd a face most fair : 
— " My Love ! my Ella !" Edmund flew. 

And clasp'd the yielding air. 

" Ha! who art thou?" His cheek grew pale ; 

A well-known voice repHed, 
" Ella, the lily of the vale ; 

Ella — thy destined bride." 

To win his neck her airy arms 

The pallid phantom spread ; 
Recoiling from her blasted charms, 

The affrighted lover fled. 

To shun the visionary maid. 

His speed outstript the wind ; 
But, — though unseen to move, — the shade 

Was evermore behind. 

So Death's unerring arrows glide, 

Yet seem suspended still ; 
Nor pause, nor shrink, nor turn aside, 

But smite, subdue, and kill. 



O'er many a mountain, moor, and vale, 

On that tremendous night, 
The ghost of Ella, wild and pale. 

Pursued her lover's flight. 

But when the dawn began to gleam, 

Ere yet the morning shone. 
She vanish'd like a nightmare-dream, 

And Edmund stood alone. 

Three days, bewilder'd and forlorn. 
He sought his home in vain ; 

At length he hail'd the hoary thorn 
That crown'd his native plain. 

'Twas evening ; — all the air was halm. 

The heavens serenely clear ; 
When the soft music of a psalm 

Came pensive o'er his ear. 

Then sunk his heart ; — a strange surmise 

Made all his blood run cold : 
He flew, — a funeral met his eyes : 

He paused, — a death-bell toU'd. 

" 'Tis she ! 'tis she !" — He bursts away ; 

And bending o'er the spot 
Where all that once was Ella lay, 

Hq all beside forgot. 

A maniac now, in dumb despair. 

With love-bewilder'd mien, 
He wanders, weeps, and watches there, 

Among the hillocks green. 

And every Eve of pale St. Mark, 

As village hinds relate, 
He walks with Ella in the dark. 

And reads the rolls of Fate. 




HANNAH. 

At fond sixteen my roving heart 
Was pierced by Love's delightful dart : 
Keen transport throbb'd through every vein, 
— I never felt so sweet a pain ! 

Where circling woods embower'd the glade, 
I met the dear romantic maid : 
I stole her hand, — it shrunk, — but no ; 
I would not let my captive go. 

With all the fervency of j^outh. 
While passion told the tale of truth, 
I mark'd my Hannah's downcast eye — 
'Twas kind, but beautifully shy : 

Not with a warmer, purer ray. 
The sun, enamour'd, woos young May ; 
Nor May, with softer maiden grace. 
Turns from the sun her blushing face. 

But, SAvifter than the frighted dove, 
Fled the gay morning of my love ; 
Ah ! that so bright a morn, so soon ^ 
Should vanish in so dark a noon. 

The angel of Affliction rose, 
And in his grasp a thousand woes ; 
He pour'd his vial on my head, 
And all the heaven of rapture fled. 

Yet, in the glory of my pride, 

I stood, — and all his wrath defied ; 

I stood, — though whirlwinds shook my brain. 

And lightnings cleft my soul in twain. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



I shunn'd my nymph ; — and knew not why 
I durst not meet her gentle eye ; 
I shunn'd her, for I could not bear 
To marry her to my despair. 

Yet, sick at heart with hope delay'd, 
Oft the dear image of that maid 
Glanced, like the rainbow, o'er my mind. 
And promised happiness behind. 

The storm blew o'er, and in my breast 
The halcyon Peace rebuilt her nest : 
The storm blew o'er, and clear and mild 
The sea of Youth and Pleasure smiled. 

'Twas on the merry morn of May, 
To Hannah's cot I took my way : 
My eager hopes were on the wing, 
Like swallows sporting in the spring. 

Then as I climb'd the mountains o'er, 
I lived my wooing days once more ; 
And fancy sketch'd my married lot. 
My wife, my children, and my cot. 

I saw the village steeple rise, — 
My soul sprang, sparkling, in my eyes : 
The rural bells rang sweet and clear, — 
My fond heart listen'd in mine ear. 

I reach'd the hamlet : — all was gay ; 

I love a rustic holyday : 

I met a wedding, — stepp'd aside ; 

It pass'd, — my Hannah was the bride. 

There is a grief that cannot feel ; 

It leaves a wound that will not heal ; 

My heart grew cold, — it felt not then ; 

When shall it cease to feel again ? 



A FIELD FLOWEK. 



A FIELD FLOWER. 

FINDING ONE IN FULL BLOOM, ON CHRISTMAS DAY, 1803. 

There is a flower, a little flower, 
With silver crest and golden eye, 

That welcomes every changing hour, 
And weathers every sky. 

The prouder beauties of the field 
In gay but quick succession shine. 

Race after race their honours yield. 
They flourish and decline. 

But this small flower, to Nature dear. 

While moons and stars their courses run, 

Wreathes the whole circle of the year. 
Companion of the Sun. 

It smiles upon the lap of May, 

To sultry August spreads its charms, 

Lights pale October on his way. 
And twines December's arms. 

The purple heath and golden broom 
On moory mountains catch the gale, 

O'er lawns the lily sheds perfume, 
The violet in the vale. 

But this bold floweret climbs the hill, 
Hides in the forest, haunts the glen, 

Plays on the margin of the rill, 
Peeps round the fox's den. 

Within the garden's cultured round 
It shares the sweet carnation's bed ; 

And blooms on consecrated ground 
In honour of the dead. 




The lambkin crops its crimson gem, 

The wild-bee murmurs on its breast, 
The blue-fly bends its pensile stem, 

Light o'er the sky-lark's nest. 
'Tis Flora's page ; in every place. 

In every season fresh and fair, 
It opens w^ith perennial grace, 

And blossoms every where. 
On waste and woodland, rock and plain. 

Its humble buds unheeded rise ; 
The Rose has but a summer-reign. 

The DAISY never dies. 



THE SNOW-DROP. 



Winter, retire. 

Thy reign is past ; 

Hoary Sire, 

Yield the sceptre of thy sway, 

Sound thy trumpet in the blast. 

And call thy storms away. 

Winter, retire ; 

Wherefore do thy wheels delay ? 

Mount the chariot of thine ire, 

And quit the realms of day ; 

On thy state 

Whirlwinds wait ; 

And blood-shot meteors lend thee light ; 

Hence to dreary arctic regions 

Summon thy terrific legions ; 

Hence to caves of northern night 

Speed thy flight. 

From halcyon seas 
And purer skies, 
O southern breeze ! 
Awake, arise : 



THE SNOW-DROP. 

Breath of heaven, benignly blow, 

Melt the snow : 

Breath of heaven, unchain the floods, 

Warm the Avoods, 

And make the mountains flow. 

Auspicious to the Muse's prayer, 

The freshening gale 

Embalms the vale, 

And breathes enchantment through the air ; 

On its wing 

Floats the Spring, 

With glowing eye, and golden hair : 

Dark before her Angel-form 

She drives the demon of the storm, 

Like Gladness chasing Care. 

Winter's gloomy night withdrawn, 
Lo ! the young romantic Hours 
Search the hill, the dale, the lawn. 
To behold the SNOW-DROP white 
Start to light. 

And shine in Flora's desert bowers. 
Beneath the vernal dawn. 
The Morning Star of Flowers. 

Oh ! welcome to our isle. 

Thou Messenger of Peace ! 

At whose bewitching smile 

The embattled tempests cease : 

Emblem of Innocence and Truth, 

First born of Nature's Avomb, 

When strong in renovated youth 

She bursts from Winter's tomb ; 

Thy parent's ej'^e hath shed 

A precious dew-drop on thine head. 

Frail as a mother's tear 

Upon her infant's face. 

When ardent hope to tender fear, 

And anxious love, gives place. 




But, lo ! the dew-drop flits away, 
The sun salutes thee with a ray- 
Warm as a mother's kiss 
Upon her infant's cheek, 
When the heart bounds with bliss, 
And joy that cannot speak. 

When I meet thee by the way, 

Like a pretty sportive child, 

On the winter-wasted wild, 

With thy darling breeze at play. 

Opening to the radiant sky 

All the sweetness of thine eye ; 

— Or bright with sunbeams, fresh with showers, 

O thou Fairy-Q,ueen of flowers ! 

Watch thee o'er the plain advance 

At the head of Flora's dance ; 

Simple SNOW-DROP, then in thee 

All thy sister-train I see ; 

Every brilliant bud that blows. 

From the blue-bell to the rose ; 

All the beauties that appear 

On the bosom of the Year, 

All that wreathe the locks of Spring, 

Summer's ardent breath perfume, 

Or on the lap of Autumn bloom, 

— All to thee their tribute bring. 

Exhale their incense at thy shrine, 

— Their hues, their odours, all are thine. 

For while thy humble form I view. 

The Muse's keen prophetic sight 

Brings fair Futurity to hght. 

And Fancy's magic makes the vision true. 

— There is a Winter in my soul. 

The winter of despair ; 

Oh, when shall Spring its rage control ? 

When shall the snow-drop blossom there ? 

Cold gleams of comfort sometimes dart 



AN EPITAPH. 



--A dawn of glory on my heart, 
But quickly pass away : 
Thus Northern-lights the gloom adorn, 
And give the promise of a morn 
That never turns to day ! 

But, hark ! methinks I hear 

A still small whisper in mine ear ; 

" Rash youth, repent : 

Afflictions, from above, 

Are angels sent 

On embassies of love. 

A fiery legion at thy birth. 

Of chastening woes were given. 

To pluck the flowers of hope from earth, 

And plant them high 

O'er yonder sky, 

Transform'd to stars, — and fix'd in heaven.' 

1S05. 



AN EPITAPH. 



Art thou a man of honest mould, 

With fervent heart, and soul sincere ? 

A husbanS, father, friend ? — Behold, 
Thy brother slumbers here. 

The sun that wakes yon violet's bloom, 
Once cheer'd his eye, now dark in death, 

The wind that wanders o'er his tomb 
Was once his vital breath. 

The roving wind shall pass away, 
The Avarming sun forsake the sky ; 

Thy brother, in that dreadful day. 
Shall live and never die. 



THE OCEAN. 

WRITTEN AT SCARBOROUGH, IN THE SUMMER OF 1805. 

All hail to the ruins,* the rocks and the shores ! 
Thou wide-roUing Ocean, all hail ! 

Now brilHant with sunbeams, and dimpled with oars, 
Now dark with the fresh-blowing gale. 
While soft o'er thy bosom the cloud-shadows sail, 

And the silver wing'd sea-fowl on high, 

Like meteors bespangle the sky, 

Or dive in the gulf, or triumphantly ride 

Like foam on the surges, the swans of the tide. 

From the tumult and smoke of the city set free, 

With eager and awful delight, 
From the crest of the mountain I gaze upon thee ; 

I gaze, — and am changed at the sight ; 

For mine eye is illumined, my Genius takes flight, 
My soul, like the sun, Avith a glance 
Embraces the boundless expanse. 
And moves on thy waters, wherever they roll. 
From the day-darting zone to the night-shadow'd pole. 

My spirit descends where the day-spring is born. 
Where the billows are rubies on fire. 

And the breezes that rock the hght cradle of morn 
Are sweet as the Phoenix's pyre : 
O regions of beauty, of love, and desire ! 

O gardens of Eden ! in vain 

Placed far on the fathomless main. 

Where Nature with Innocence dwelt in her youth. 

When pure was her heart, and unbroken her truth. 

* Scarborough Castle. 




But now the fair rivers of Paradise wind 

Through countries and kingdoms o'erthrown : 

Where the giant of Tyranny crushes mankind, 
Where he reigns, — and will soon reign alone ; 
For wide and more wide, o'er the sun-beaming zone, 

He stretches his hundred-fold arms, 

Despoiling, destroying its charms ; 

Beneath his broad footstep the Ganges is dry, 

And the mountains recoil from the flash of his eye. 

Thus the pestilent Upas, the Demon of trees. 

Its boughs o'er the wilderness spreads. 
And with livid contagion polluting the breeze. 

Its mildewing influence sheds : 

The birds on the wing, and the flowers in their beds, 
Are slain by its venomous breath. 
That darkens the noonday with death ; 
And pale ghosts of travellers wander around. 
While their mouldering skeletons whiten the ground. 

Ah! why hath Jehovah, in forming the world. 
With the waters divided the land, 

His ramparts of rocks round the continent hurl'd. 
And cradled the Deep in his hand. 
If man may transgress his eternal command. 

And leap o'er the bounds of his birth. 

To ravage the uttermost earth. 

And violate nations and realms that should be 

Distinct as the billows, yet one as the sea ? 

There are, gloomy Ocean ! a brotherless clan. 

Who traverse thy banishing waves 
The poor disinherited outcasts of m&n, 

Whom Avarice coins into slaves : 

From the homes of their kindred, their forefathers' graves, 
Love, friendship, and conjugal bliss, 
Thev are dragg'd on the hoary abyss ; 
The shark hears their shrieks, and, ascending to day, 
Demands of the spoiler his share of the prey. 




Then joy to the tempest that whelms them beneath, 

And makes their destruction its sport ! 
But wo to the winds that propitiously breathe, 

And waft them in safety to port, 

Where the vuhures and vampires of Mammon resort : 
Where Europe exultingly drains 
The life-blood from Africa's veins ; 
Where man rules o'er man with a merciless rod. 
And spurns at his footstool the image of God ! 

The hour is approaching, — a terrible hour ! 
And Vengeance is bending her bow ; 

Already the clouds of the hurricane lour. 
And the rock-rending whirlwinds blow : 
Back rolls the huge Ocean, Hell opens below : 

The floods return headlong, — they sweep 

The slave-cultured lands to the deep ; 

In a moment entomb'd in the horrible void, 

By their Maker Himself in his anger destroy'd ! 

Shall this be the fate of the cane-planted isles, 

More lovely than clouds in the Avest, 
When the sun o'er the ocean descending in smiles 

Sinks softly and sweetly to rest ? 

— NO ! — Father of mercy ! befriend the opprest ; 
At the voice of thy Gospel of peace 
May the sorrows of Africa cease ; 
And the slave and his master devoutly unite 
To walk in thy freedom, and dwell in thy light !* 

As homeward my weary-wing'd Fancy extends 
Her star-lighted course through the skies. 

High over the mighty Atlantic ascends, 
And turns upon Europe her eyes ; 
Ah me ! what new prospects, new horrors arise ! 



* Alluding to the plorimis success of the Moravian Missionaries among the 
Negroes in the West Indies. 



I see the war-tempested flood 

All foaming-, and panting with blood; 

The panic-struck Ocean in agony roars, 

Rebounds from the battle, and flies to his shores ; 

For Britannia is wielding the trident to-day. 

Consuming her foes in her ire. 
And hurling the thunder of absolute sway 

From her wave-ruling chariots of fire : 

— She triumphs ; — the winds and the waters conspire 
To spread her invincible name ; 
— The universe rings with her fame ; 
— But the cries of the fatherless mix with her praise, 
And the tears of the widow are shed oit her bays.* 

O Britain ! dear Britain ! the land of my birth ; 

O Isle, most enchantingly fair ! 
Thou Pearl of the Ocean ! Thou Gem of the Earth ! 

O my Mother ! my Mother ! beware ; 

For wealth is a phantom, and empire a snare : 
O let not thy birthright be sold 
For reprobate glory and gold ! 
Thy distant dominions like wild graftings shoot. 
They weigh down thy trunk — they will tear up thy root : — 

The root of thine OAK, O my country ! that stands 
Rock-planted, and flourishing free ; 

Its branches are stretch'd o'er the uttermost lands. 
And its shadow eclipses the sea : 
The blood of our ancestors nourish'd the tree ; 

From their tombs, from their ashes it sprung ; 

Its boughs with their trophies are hung ; 

Their spirit dwells in it : — and, hark ! for it spoke ; 

The voice of our fathers ascends from their Oak : — 



* While the author was meditating these stanzas, in sight of the ocean from 
the northern cliSs, intelligence arrived of the naval victory of Sir Robert Calder, 
over the French and Spanish fleets off the western coast of Spain. 



i34 MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 

" Ye Britons, who dwell where we conquer'd of old, 

Who inherit our battle-field graves ; 
Though poor were your fathers, — gigantic and bold, 

We were not, we could not be slaves ; 

But firm as our rocks, and as free as our waves, 
The spears of the Romans we broke, 
We never stoop'd under their yoke ; 
In the shipwreck of nations we stood up alone, — 
The Avorld was great Cesar's, — but Britain our own. 

"For ages and ages, with barbarous foes, 

The Saxon, Norwegian, and Gaul, 
We wrestled, were foil'd, were cast down, but we rose 

With new vigour, new life from each fall ; 

By all we were conquer'' d : — we conquer'd them all ! 
— The cruel, the cannibal mind. 
We soften'd, subdued, and refined : 

Bears, wolves, and sea monsters, they rush'd from their den ; 
We taught them, we tamed them, we turn'd them to men. 

" Love led the wild hordes in his flower-woven bands, 

The tenderest, strongest of chains : 
Love married our hearts, he united our hands. 

And mingled the blood in our veins : 

One race we became : — on the mountains and plains 
Where the wounds of our country were closed, 
The Ark of Religion reposed, 
The unquenchable Altar of Liberty blazed. 
And the Temple of Justice in Mercy was raised. 

" Ark, Altar, and Temple, we left with our breath ! 
To our children, a sacred bequest : 

O guard them, O keep them, in life and in death ! 
So the shades of your fathers shall rest. 
And your spirits with ours be in Paradise blest : 

— Let Ambition, the sin of the brave. 

And Avarice, the soul of a slave. 

No longer seduce your affections to roam 

From Liberty, Justice, ReHgion, AT HOME." 



THE COMMON LOT. 

A Birthday Meditation, during a solitary winter walk, of seven miles, betweeri 
a village in Derbyshire and Sheliield, when the ground was covered with 
anew, the sky serene, and the morning air intensely pure. 

Once in the flight of ages past, 

There lived a man : — and who was he ? 

— Mortal ! howe'er thy lot be cast, 
That Man resembled Thee. 

Unknown the region of his birth, 

The land in Avhich he died unknown : 

His name has perish'd from the earth ; 
This truth survives alone : — 

That joy and grief, and hope and fear, 

Ahernate triumph'd in his breast ; 
His bhss and wo, — a smile, a tear ! 

— Oblivion hides the rest. 

The bounding pulse, the languid hmb, 
The changing spirits' rise and fall ; 

We know that these were felt by him. 
For these are felt by all. 

He suffer'd, — but his pangs are o'er ; 

Enjoy'd, — but his delights are fled ; 
Had friends, — his friends are now no more ; 

And foes, — his foes are dead. 

He loved, but whom he loved, the grave 
Hath lost in its unconscious womb : 

Oh, she was fair ! — but nought could save 
Her beauty from the tomb. 

He saw whatever thou hast seen ; 

Encounter'd all that troubles thee : 
He was — whatever thou hast been ; 

He is — what thou shalt be. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



The rolling seasons, day and night, 

Sun, moon, and stars, the earth and main, 

Erewhile his portion, life and light, 
To him exist in vain. 

The clouds and sunbeams, o'er his eye 
That once their shades and glory threw 

Have left in yonder silent sky 
No vestige where they flew. 

The annals of the human race. 

Their ruins, since the Avorld began, 

Of HIM afford no other trace 

Than this, — there lived a man ! 

JVovcmber 4, 1805. 



THE HARP OF SORROW. 

I GAVE my Harp to Sorrow's hand. 
And she has ruled the chords so long, 

They will not speak at my command ; — 
They warble only to her song. 

Of dear, departed hours, 

Too fondly loved to last, 
The dew, the breath, the bloom of flowers, 

Snapt in their freshness by the blast : 

Of long, long years of future care, 

Till lingering Nature yields her breath. 

And endless ages of despair, 

Beyond the judgment-day of death : — 

The weeping Minstrel sings ; 

And while her numbers flow, 
My spirit trembles with the strings, 

Responsive to the notes of wo. 

Would gladness move a sprightlier strain, 
And wake this wild Harp's clearest tones, 



THE HARP OF SORROW. 

The chords, impatient to complain, 
Are dumb, or only utter moans. 

And yet, to soothe the mind 

With luxury of grief, 
The soul to suffiiring all resign'd 

In sorrow's music feels relief. 

Thus o'er the light ^olian lyre 

The winds of dark November stray, 

Touch the quick nerve of every wire, 
And on its magic pulses play ; — 

Till all the air around. 

Mysterious murmurs fill, 
A strange bewildering dream of sound, 

Most heavenly sweet, — yet mournful still. 

O ! snatch the Harp from Sorrow's hand, 
Hope ! who hast been a stranger long ; 

O ! strike it with sublime command, 
And be the Poet's life thy song. 

Of vanish'd troubles sing, 

Of fears for ever fled. 
Of flowers that hear the voice of Spring, 

And burst and blossom from the dead ; — 

Of home, contentment, health, repose. 
Serene delights, while years increase ; 

And weary life's triumphant close 

In some calm sunset hour of peace ; — 

Of bliss that reigns above, 

Celestial May of Youth, 
Unchanging as Jehovah's love. 

And everlasting as his truth : — 

Sing, heavenly hope ! — and dart thine hand 
O'er my frail Harp, untuned so long ; 

That Harp shall breathe, at thy command. 
Immortal sweetness through thy song. 



Ah ! then, this gloom control, 
And at thy voice shall start 

A new creation in my soul, 
A native Eden in my heart. 



POPE'S WILLOW. 



Written for an Urn, made out of the Trunk of the Weeping Willow, imported 
from the East, and planted by Pope in his grounds at Twickenham, where it 
flourished many years ; but, falling into decay, it was lately cut down. 

Ere Pope resign'd his tuneful breath, 

And made the turf his pillow. 
The minstrel hung his harp in death 

Upon the drooping Willow ; 
That Willow from Euphrates' strand, 
Had sprung beneath his training hand. 

Long as revolving seasons flew. 

From youth to age it flourish'd. 
By vernal winds and starhght dew, 

By showers and sunbeams nourish'd ; 
And while in dust the Poet slept, 
The Willow o'er his ashes wept. 

Old Time beheld its silvery head 

With graceful grandeur towering, 
Its pensile boughs profusely spread, 

The breezy lawn embowering. 
Till, arch'd around, there seem'd to shoot 
A grove of scions from one root. 



Thither, at summer noon, he view'd 
The lovely Nine retreating. 




Beneath its twilight soHtude 

With songs their Poet greeting, 
Whose spirit in the Willow spoke, 
Like Jove's from dark Dodona's oak. 

By harvest moonhght there he spied 

The fairy bands advancing ; 
Bright Ariel's troop, on Thames's side. 

Around the Willow dancing ; 
Gay sylphs among the foliage play'd, 
And glow-worms glitter'd in the shade. 

One morn, while Time thus mark'd the tree 

In beauty green and glorious, 
"The hand," he cried, "that planted thee, 

O'er mine was oft victorious ; 
Be vengeance now my calm employ, — 
One work of Pope's I will destroy." 

He spake, and struck a silent blow 
With that dread arm, whose motion 

Lays cedars, thrones, and temples low, 
And wields o'er land and ocean 

The unremitting axe of doom, 

That fells the forest of the tomb. 

Deep to the WiUow's root it went, 

And cleft the core asunder. 
Like sudden, secret hghtning, sent 

Without recording thunder : — 
— From that sad moment, slow away 
Began the Willow to decay. 

In vain did Spring those bowers restore, 
Where loves and graces revell'd. 

Autumn's wild gales the branches tore, 
The thin gray leaves dishevell'd. 

And every wasting Winter found 

The Willow nearer to the ground. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



Hoary, and weak, and bent with age, 

At length the axe assail'd it : 
It bow'd before the woodman's rage ; 

The swans of Thames bewail'd it, 
With softer tones, with sweeter breath, 
Than ever charm'd the ear of death. 

O Pope ! hadst thou, whose lyre so long 
The wondering world enchanted. 

Amidst thy paradise of song 

This Weeping Willow planted ; 

Among thy loftiest laurels seen, 

In deathless verse for ever green, — 

Thy chosen Tree had stood subHme, 

The storms of ages braving, 
Triumphant o'er the wrecks of Time 

Its verdant banner waving, 
While regal pyramids decay'd. 
And empires perish 'd in its shade. 

An humbler lot, O Tree ! was thine, 
—Gone down in all thy glory ; 

The sweet, the mournful task be mine, 
To sing thy simple story ; 

Though verse like mine in vain would raise 

The fame of thy departed days. 

Yet, fallen Willow ! if to me 
Such power of song were given. 

My lips should breathe a soul through thee, 
And call down fire from heaven, 

To kindle in this hallow'd Urn 

A flame that would for ever burn. 



A WALK IN SPRING. Ml 



A WALK IN SPRING. 

I wander'd in a lonely glade, 
Where, issuing from the forest shade, 

A Httle mountain stream 
Along the winding valley play'd, 

Beneath the morning beam. 

Light o'er the woods of dark brown oak 

The west-wind wreathed the hovering smoke. 

From cottage roofs conceal'd, 
Below a rock abruptly broke. 

In rosy light reveal'd. 

'Twas in the infancy of May, — 
The uplands glow'd in green array, 

While from the ranging eye 
The lessening landscape stretch'd away. 

To meet the bending sky. 

'Tis sweet in solitude to hear 
The earhest music of the year, 

The Blackbird's loud wild note. 
Or, from the wintry thicket drear, 

The Thrush's stammering throat. 

In rustic solitude 'tis sweet 

The earliest flowers of Spring to greet, — 

The violet from its tomb. 
The strawberry, creeping at our feet, 

The sorrel's simple bloom. 

Wherefore I love the walks of Spring, — 
While still I hear new warblers sing, 

Fresh-opening bells I see ; 
Joy flits on every roving wing, 

Hope buds on every tree. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



That morn I look'd and listen'd long, 
Some cheering sight, some woodland song, 

As yet unheard, unseen, 
To welcome, with remembrance strong 

Of days that once had been ; — 

When gathering flowers, an eager child, 
I ran abroad with rapture wild ; 

Or, on more curious quest, 
Peep'd breathless through the copse, and smiled, 

To see the linnet's nest. 

Already had I watch'd the flight 

Of swallows darting through the light, 

And mock'd the cuckoo's call ; 
Already view'd, o'er meadows bright, 

The evening rainbow fall. 

Now in my walk, with sweet surprise, 
I saw the first Spring cowslip rise, 

The plant Avhose pensile flowers 
Bend to the earth their beauteous eyes, 

In sunshine as in showers. 

Lone on a mossy bank it grew. 

Where lichens, purple, white, and blue. 

Among the verdure crept ; 
Its yellow ringlets, dropping dew, 

The breezes lightly swept. 

A bee had nestled on its blooms. 

He shook abroad their rich perfumes, 

Then fled in airy rings : 
His place a butterfly assumes. 

Glancing his glorious wings. 

Oh, welcome, as a friend ! I cried ; 
A friend through many a season tried, 

Nor ever sought in vain. 
When May, with Flora at her side. 

Is dancing on the plain. 



A WALK IN SPRING. 



Sure as the Pleiades adorn 
The ghttering coronet of morn, 

In calm delicious hours, 
Beneath their beams thy buds are born, 

'JMidst love-awakening showers. 

Scatter'd by Nature's graceful hand. 
In briary glens, o'er pasture-land. 

Thy fairy tribes we meet ; 
Gay in the milk-maid's path they stand, 

They kiss her tripping feet. 

From winter's farm-yard bondage freed, 
The cattle bounding o'er the mead, 

Where green the herbage grows. 
Among thy fragrant blossoms feed. 

Upon thy tufts repose. 

Tossing his forelock o'er his mane. 
The foal, at rest upon the plain. 

Sports with thy flexile stalk, 
But stoops his little neck in vain 

To crop it in his walk. 

Where thick thy primrose blossoms play, 
Lovely and innocent as they. 

O'er coppice lawns and dells, 
In bands the rural children stray, 

To pluck thy nectar'd bells ; 

Whose simple sweets, with curious skill. 
The frugal cottage-dames distil. 

Nor envy France the vine, 
While many a festal cup they fill 

With Britain's homely wine. 

Unchanging still from year to year. 
Like stars returning in their sphere, 

With undiminish'd rays, 
Thy vernal constellations cheer 

The dawn of lengthening days. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



Perhaps from Nature's earliest May, 
Imperishable 'midst decay, 

Thy self-renewing race 
Have breathed their balmy lives away 

In this neglected place. 

And, oh ! till Nature's final doom. 
Here unmolested may they bloom. 

From scythe and plough secure. 
This bank their cradle and their tomb. 

While earth and skies endure ! 

Yet, lowly Cowslip, while in thee 
An old unalter'd friend I see, 

Fresh in perennial prime ; 
From Spring to Spring behold in me 

The woes and waste of Time. 

This fading eye and withering mien 
Tell what a sufferer I have been, 

Since more and more estranged. 
From hope to hope, from scene to scene, 

Through Folly's wilds I ranged. 

Then fields and Avoods I proudly spurn'd ; 
From Nature's maiden love I turn'd, 

And wooed the enchantress Art ; 
Yet while for her my fancy burn'd, 

Cold was my wretched heart, — 

Till, distanced in Ambition's race. 
Weary of Pleasure's joyless chase, 

My peace untimely slain, 
Sick of the world, 1 turn'd my face 

To fields and woods again. 

'Twas Spring; — my former haunts I found. 
My favourite flowers adorn'd the ground. 

My darling minstrels play'd ; 
The mountains were with sunset crown'd. 

The valleys dun with shade. 



TO AGNES. 



With lorn delight the scene I view'd, 
Past joys and sorrows were renew'd ; 

My infant hopes and fears 
Look'd lovely, through the soHtude 

Of retrospective years. 
And still, in Memory's twilight howers. 
The spirits of departed hours. 

With mellowing tints, portray 
The blossoms of life's vernal flowers 

For ever fall'n away. 
Till youth's delirious dream is o'er, 
Sanguine with hope, we look before, 

The future good to find ; 
In age when error charms no more, 

For bUss we look behind. 



TO AGNES. 

REPLY TO SOME LINES, BEGINNING " ARREST, O TIME, THY FLEETING 
COURSE." 

Time will not check his eager flight. 

Though gentle Agnes scold, 
For 'tis the Sage's dear delight 

To make young Ladies old. 

Then listen, Agnes, friendship sings ; 

Seize fast his forelock gray, 
And pluck from his careering wings 

A feather every day. 

Adorn'd with these, defy his rage, 

And bid him plough your face, 
For every furrow of old age 

Shall be a line of grace. 

Start not ; old age is virtue's prime ; 
Most lovely she appears. 



Clad in the spoils of vanquish'd Time, 
Down in the vale of years. 

Beyond that vale, in boundless bloom, 
The eternal mountains rise : 

Virtue descends not to the tomb. 
Her rest is in the skies. 



A DEED OF DARKNESS. 

The body of the Missionary, John Smith, (who died February 6, 1824, in prison, 
under sentence of death by a court-martial, in Ueinerara,) was ordered to be 
buried secretly at night, and no person, not even his widow, was allowed to 
follow the corpse. Mrs. Smith, however, and her friend Mrs. Elliott, accom- 
panied by a free Negro, carrying a lantern, repaired beforehand to the spot 
where a grave had been dug, and there they awaited the interment, which 
took place accordingly. His Majesty's pardon, annulling the condemnation, 
is said to have arrived on the day of the unfortunate Missionary's death, from 
the rigours of confinement, in a tropical cliiuate, and under the slow pains of 
an inveterate malady, previously afflicting him. 

Come down in thy profoundest gloom. 

Without one vagrant fire-fly's light, 
Beneath thine ebon arch entomb 

Earth, from the gaze of heaven, O Night ! 
A deed of darkness must be done. 
Put out the moon, hold back the sun. 

Are these the criminals, that flee 

Like deeper shadows through the shade ? 

A flickering lamp, from tree to tree 
Betrays their path along the glade. 

Led by a Negro ; — now they stand. 

Two trembling women, hand in hand. 

A grave, an open grave, appears ; 

O'er this in agony they bend. 
Wet the fresh turf with bitter tears ; 

Sighs following sighs their bosoms rend : 
These are not murderers ! — these have known 
Grief more bereaving than their own. 




Oft through the gloom their straining eyes 
Look forth, for what they fear to meet : 

It comes ; they catch a ghmpse ; it flies : 
(iuick-glancing hghts, slow-tramping feet, 

Amidst the cane-crops, — seen, heard, gone, — 

Return, — and in dead-march move on. 

A stern procession ! — gleaming arms, 

And spectral countenances dart, 
By the red torch-flame, wild alarms, 

And withering pangs through either heart ; 
A corpse amidst the group is home, 
A prisoner's corpse who died last morn. 

Not by the slave-lord's justice slain, 

Who doom'd him to a traitor's death ; 
While royal mercy sped in vain 

O'er land and sea to save his breath; 
No ; the frail hfe that warm'd this clay 
Man could not give nor take away. 
His vengeance and his grace, alike. 
Were impotent to spare or kill ; 

He may not lift the sword to strike, 

Nor turn its edge aside, at Avill ; 
Here, by one sovereign act and deed, 
God cancell'd all that man decreed. 
Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. 

That corpse is to the grave consign'd ; 
The scene departs : — this buried trust 

The Judge of quick and dead shall find. 
When things which Time and Death have seal'd, 
Shall be in flaming fire reveal' d. 
The fire shall try Thee, then, like gold. 

Prisoner of hope ! — await the test : 
And oh ! when truth alone is told. 

Be thy clear innocence confess'd ! 
The fire shall try thy foes ;— may they 
Find mercy in that dreadful day. 



THE DIAL. 

This shadow on the Dial's face, 

That steals from day to day, 
With slow, unseen, unceasing pace. 

Moments, and months, and years away ; 
This shadow, which, in every clime, 

Since light and motion first began, 
Hath held its course sublime ; — 

What is it ? Mortal Man ! 

It is the scythe of Time : 

— A shadow only to the eye ; 

Yet, in its calm career. 
It levels all beneath the sky ; 

And still, through each succeeding year, 
Right onward, with resistless power. 
Its stroke shall darken every hour. 
Till Nature's race be run, 
And Time's last shadow shall eclipse the sun. 

Nor only o'er the Dial's face. 

This silent phantom, day by day. 
With slow, unseen, unceasing pace, 

Steals moments, months, and years au'ay ; 
From hoary rock and aged tree, 

From proud Palmyra's mouldering walls, 
From Teneriffe, towering o'er the sea. 

From every blade of grass it falls ; 
For still, where'er a shadow sweeps. 

The scythe of Time destroys. 
And man at every footstep weeps 

O'er evanescent joys ; 



Like flow'rets glittering with the dews of mom, 
Fair for a moment, then for ever shorn : 
— Ah ! soon, beneath the inevitable blow, 
I too shall lie in dust and darkness low. 

Then Time, the Conqueror, will suspend 

His scythe, a trophy, o'er my tomb. 
Whose moving shadow shall portend 

Each frail beholder's doom : 
O'er the wide earth's illumined space, 

Though Time's triumphant flight be shown, 
The truest index on its face 

Points from the churchyard stone. 



EMBLEMS. 



An evening cloud, in brief suspense, 

Was hither driven and thither. 
It came, I saw not whence. 

It went, I knew not whither ; 
I watch'd it changing, in the wind, 

Size, semblance, form, and hue. 
Lessening and fading, till behind 

It left no speck on heaven's pure blue. 

Amidst the marshall'd host of night 
Shone a new star supremely bright ; 
With marvelling eye, well pleased to err, 

I hail'd that prodigy ; — anon. 
It fell,— it fell like Lucifer, 

A flash, — a blaze, — a train, — 'twas gone 
And then I sought in vain its place, 
Throughout the infinite of space. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



Dew-drops, at day-spring, deck'd a line 

Of gossamer so frail, so fine, 

A gnat's wing shook it : — round and clear 

As if by fairy-fingers strung. 
Like orient pearls at beauty's ear. 

In trembling brilliancy they hung 
Upon a rosy brier, whose bloom 
Shed nectar round them, and perfume. 

Ere long exhaled in limpid air, 

Some mingled with the breath of morn, 
While some slid singly, here and there, 

Like tears by their own weight down borne ; 
At length the film itself collapsed, and where 

The pageant glitter' d, lo ! a naked thorn. 

What are the living ? — hark ! a sound 

From grave and cradle crying. 
By earth and ocean echoed round, 

— " The living are the dying T^ 

From infancy to utmost age. 

What is man's scene of pilgrimage ? 

The passage to death's portal ! 
The moment we begin to be. 
We enter on the agony, 

— The dead are the immortal ; 
TTiey live not on expiring breath. 
They only are exempt from death. 

Cloud-atoms, sparkles of a failing star, 

Dew-drops on gossamer, all are : 

What can the state beyond us be ? 

Life ? — Death ? — Ah ! no, — a greater mystery ; 

What thought hath not conceived, ear heard, eye seen ; 
Perfect existence from a point begun ; 

Part of what God's eternity hath been, — 
Whole immortality belongs to none. 
But Him, the First, the Last, the Only One. 



A MESSAGE FROM THE MOON. 



A MESSAGE FROM THE MOON: 

A THOUGHT AT EXETER, DURING THE GREAT ECLIPSE OF THE SUN, 
MAY 15, 1836. 

The evening star peep'd forth at noon, 
To learn what ail'd the sun, her sire. 

When, lo ! the mtervening moon 

Plunged her black shadow through his fire ; 

Of ray by ray his orb bereft, 

Till but one slender curve was left, 
And that seein'd trembhng to expire. 

The sickening atmosphere grew dim, 

A faint, chill breeze crept over all ; 
As in a swoon, when objects SAvim 

Away from sight, — a thickening pall 
Of horror, boding worse to come. 
That struck both field and city dumb, 

O'er man and brute was felt to fall. 

" Avaunt, insatiate fiend !" I cry, — 
" Like vampire stealing from its grave 

To drain some sleeper's hfe-strings dry, 
Back to thine interlunar cave ; 

Ere the last glimpse of fountain-hght, 

Absorpt by thee, bring on a night 

From which nor moon nor morn can save." 

While yet I spake, that single beam 
(Bent like Apollo's bow half-strung) 

Broaden'd and brighten'd ; — gleam o'er gleam, 
Splendours that out of darkness sprung, 

The sun's unveiling disk o'erflow'd, 

Till forth in all his strength he rode, 
For ever beautiful and young. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



Reviving Nature own'd his power ; 

And joy and mirth with light and heat, 
Music and fragrance, hail'd the hour 

When his deliverance was complete : 
Aloft again the swallow flew, 
The cock, at second day-break crew ; 

When suddenly a voice most sweet ; — 

A voice, as from the ethereal sphere, 
Of one unseen yet passing by. 

Came with such rapture on mine ear, 
My soul sprang up into my eye ; 

But naught around could I behold. 

No " mortal mixture of earth's mould," 
Breathed that enchanting harmony. 

" How have I wrong'd thee, angry bard ! 

What evil to your world have done ? 
That I, the moon, should be debarr'd 

From free communion with the sun ? 
If, while I turn'd on him my face, 
Your's was o'ercast a httle space. 

Already are amends begun. 

" The lustre I have gather'd now. 

Not to myself I will confine ; 
Night after night, my crescent brow. 

My full and waning globe shall shine 
On yours, — till every spark is spent. 
Which /or us both to me was lent ; 

— Thus I fulfil the law divine. 

" A nobler sun on thee hath shone. 
On thee bestow'd benigner light ; 

Walk in that light, but not alone. 
Like me to darlding eyes give sight: 

This is the way God's gifts to use. 

First to enjoy them, then diffuse, 

— Learn from the moon that lesson right. 



A BRIDAL BENISON. 



A BRIDAL BENISON. 

ADDRESSED TO MY FRIENDS MR. AND MRS. B. 

OcKAN and land the globe divide, 
Summer and winter share the year, 

Darkness and light walk side by side, 
And earth and heaven are always near. 

Though each be good and fair alone, 
And glorious, in its time and place, 

In all, when fitly pair'd, is shown 

More of their Maker's power and grace. 

Then may the union of young hearts. 

So early and so well begun, 
Like sea and shore, in all their parts, 

Appear as twain, but be as one. 

Be it Hke summer ; may they find 

Bliss, beauty, hope, where'er they roam ; 

Be it like winter, when confined. 
Peace, comfort, happiness at home. 

Like day and night, — sweet interchange 
Of care, enjoyment, action, rest ; 

Absence nor coldness e'er estrange 
Hearts by unfaihng love possest. 

Like earth's horizon, be their scene 
Of hfe, a rich and various ground, 

And, whether lowering or serene. 
Heaven all above it and around. 

When land and ocean, day and night. 
When time and nature cease to be ; 

Let their inheritance bs hght, 
Their union an eternity. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



THE BLACKBIRD. 

Those who are apt to awake early on spring mornings in rural neighbourhoods, 
must often have been charmed with the solitary song of the Blackbird, when 
all beside is still, and the Lark hinisflf is yet on the ground. — At evening, too, 
his broad and homely strain, different from that of every other, and chiming 
in at intervals with the universal chorus of wild throats, i<5 known from in- 
fancy by all who have been accustomed to walk abroad in the hour of twi- 
light. — The yellow bill and glossy plumage of the same conspicuous bird, when 
he flits from hedge to tree, or across a meadow, are equally funiliarto the eye 
of such, nor less to their ear is the chuckling note with which he bolts out of 
a bush before the startled passenger, who has unconsciously disturbed him 
from his perch. 

MORNING. 

Golden bill ! Golden bill ! 

Lo, the peep of day ; 
All the air is cool and still, 
From the elm-tree on the hill, 

Chant away : 
While the moon drops down the west, 
Like thy mate upon her nest, 
And the stars before the sun, 
Melt like snow-flakes, one by one ; 
Let thy loud and welcome lay 
Pour along 
Few notes but strong. 



Jet-bright wing! jet-bright wing ! 

Flit across the sunset glade; 
Lying there in wait to sing — 
Listen with thj^ head awry. 
Keeping time with twinkling eye, 

While from all the woodland shade, 
Birds of every plume and note 
Strain the throat, 
Till both hill and valley ring, 
And the warbled minstrelsy, 



THE MYRTLE. 



Ebbing, flowing like the sea, 
Claims brief interludes from thee : 
Then, with simple swell and fall, 
Breaking beautiful through all. 
Let thy Pan-like pipe repeat 
Few notes but sweet. 

Jskern, near Doneaster, 1835. 



THE MYRTLE. 



Dark-green and gemm'd with flowers of snow, 
With close uncrowded branches spread. 

Not proudly high, nor meanly low, 
A graceful myrtle rear'd its head. 

Its mantle of unwithering leaf, 

Seem'd, in my contemplative mood. 
Like silent joy, or patient grief, 

The symbol of pure gratitude. 
Still hfe, methought, is thine, fair tree ! 

— Then pluck'd a sprig, and while I mused. 
With idle hands, unconsciously. 

The delicate small fohage bruised. 

Odours, at my rude touch set free, 

Escaped from all their secret cells ; 
Gluick life, I cried, is thine, fair tree ! 

In thee a soul of fragrance dwells : 
Which outrage, wrongs, nor wounds destroy, 

But wake its sweetness from repose ; 
Ah ! could I thus heaven's gifts employ. 

Worth seen, worth hidden, thus disclose : 

In health, with unpretending grace, 

Inweahh, with meekness and Avith fear. 
Through every season wear one face, 
. And be in truth what I appear. 



«5e MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 

Then should affliction's chastening rod 
Bruise my frail frame, or break my heart, 

Life, a sweet sacrifice to God, 

Out-breathed like incense would depart. 

The Captain of Salvation thus, 
When like a lamb to slaughter led, 

Was, by the Father's will, for us. 
Himself through suffering purified. 



A DEATH-BED. 

" So givelh He his beloved sleep."— Psalm cxxvii. 2. 

Her path was like the shining light, 
Clear, calm, progressive, perfect day : 

At even-tide came sudden night. 

Thick darkness fell on all her way ; 

Amazed, alarm'd, she quail'd with dread, 

And cried — " The Comforter is fled !" 

It was the tempter's vantage-hour ; 

Eager and flush'd with hope was he ; 
He knew the limit of his power. 

And struggled hard for victory ; 
A deathless soul, at life's last gasp, 
Seem'dbut a hair's breadth from his grasp. 

The dire deceiver was deceived. 
That soul was in a faithful hand. 

Even his in whom her heart beheved ; 
Satan before Him could not stand, 

But fell like lightning to the deep, 

So gave He his beloved sleep. 



DALE ABBEY. 957 



DALE ABBEY. 



A solitary arch in the middle of an open meadow, and a small oratory more an- 
cient than the monastery itself, now the chapel of ease for the hamlet, are 
alone conspicuous of all the magnificent structures which once occupied this 
ground. The site is about five miles south-east from Derby. 



The glory hath departed from thee, Dale ! 

Thy gorgeous pageant of monastic pride, 

— A power, that once the power of kings defied, 
Which truth and reason might in vain assail. 
In mock humility usurp'd this vale, 

And lorded o'er the region far and wide ; 

Darkness to light, evil to good allied, 
Had wrought a charm, which made all hearts to quail. 

What gave that power dominion on this ground. 
Age after age ? — the Word of God was bound ! — 

At length the mighty captive burst from thrall, 
O'erturn'd the spiritual bastile in its march. 
And left of ancient grandeur this sole arch. 

Whose stones cry out, — " Thus Babylon herself shall 
fall." 



More beautiful in ruin than in prime, 

Methinks this frail, yet firm memorial stands, 
The work of heads laid low, and buried hands : 

— Now slowly mouldering to the touch of time, 

It looks abroad, unconsciously subhme. 

Where sky above and earth beneath expands : 
And yet a nobler relic still demands 

The grateful homage of a passing rhyme. 



Beneath the cHff yon humble roof behold ! 
Poor as our Saviour's birthplace; yet a fold, 

Where the good shepherd, in this quiet vale, 
Gathers his flock, and feeds them, as of old. 

With bread from heaven : — I change my note ; — all hail! 

The glory of the Lord is risen upon thee. Dale !* 



IN BEREAVEMENT. 

Lift up thine eyes, afflicted soul ! 

From earth Hft up thine eyes; 
Though dark the evening-shadows roll, 

And dayhght beauty dies. 
One sun is set, — a thousand more 

Their rounds of glory run. 
Where science leads thee to explore 

In every star a sun. 

Thus, when some long-loved comfort ends, 

And Nature would despair, 
Faith to the heaven of heaven ascends, 

And meets ten thousand there : 
First faint and small, then clear and bright, 

They gladden all the gloom, 
As stars that seem but points of light 

The rank of suns assume. 



* This ancient oratory is supposed to liave stood between 700 and 600 years. 
It was built by a person who had previously dwelt as a hermit in a cave which 
he had hewed in the rock adjacent, where he submitted to great hardships and 
privations. He was a native of Derby, and believed it was the will of heaven, 
that he should leave his home and friends and live in solitude. The Abbey was 
founded in 1204, near the spot where this holy man had thus lived and died. Af- 
ter being successively occupied by monks of various orders, it was broken up in 
1539. The buildings occupied a large space of ground ; but beside the arch and 
chapel nothing more than a few fragments of walls and foundations can be 
traced. 



CORONATION' ODE. 



CORONATION ODE FOR QUEEN VICTORIA. 



The sceptre in a maiden-hand, 

The reign of beauty and of youth, 
Should wake to gladness all the land. 
Where love is loyalty and truth : 
Rule, Victoria, rule the free. 
Hearts and hands we offer Thee. 

Not by the tyrant law of might, 

But by the grace of God we own. 

And by the people's voice, thy right 

To sit upon thy Father's throne : 

Rule, Victoria, rule the free, 

Heaven defend and prosper Thee. 

Thee isles and continents obey ; 

Kindreds and nations nigh and far, 
Behold the bound-marlcs of thy sway, 
— The morning and the evening star : 
Rule, Victoria, rule the free. 
Millions rest their hopes on Thee. 

No slave within thine empire breathe ! 

Before thy steps oppression fly ! 
The lamb and lion play beneath 
The meek dominion of thine eye ! 
Rule, Victoria, rule the free. 
Bonds and shackles yield to Thee. 

Still spreading influence more benign. 

Light to thy realms of darkness send. 
Till none shall name a God but thine. 
None at an idol altar bend : 

Rule, Victoria, rule the free. 

Till all tongues shall pray for Thee. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



At home, abroad, by sea, on shore, 

Blessings to thee and thine increase ; 
The sword and cannon rage no more, 

The whole world hail thee Queen of Peace ; 
Rule, Victoria, rule the free, 
And th' Almighty rule o'er Thee. 



THE WILD PINK, 

ON THE WALL OF MALMESBURY ABBEY. 

(Dianthus Cheiroplnjilus.) 

On seeing a solitary specimen near the Great Archway, and being told tliat the 
plant was not to be found elsewhere in the neighbourhood. 

The hand that gives the angels wings. 

And plants the forest by its power. 
O'er mountain, vale, and chamjiaign flings 

The seed of every herb and flower ; 
Nor forests stand, nor angels fly. 
More at God's will, more in his eye. 
Than the green blade strikes down its root, 
Expands its bloom, and yields its fruit. 

Beautiful daughter of a line 

Of unrecorded ancestry ! 
What herald's scroll could vie with thine, 

Where monarchs trace their pedigree ? 
Thy first progenitor had birth 
While man was yet unquicken'd earth. 
And thy last progeny may wave 
Its flag o'er man's last-open'd grave. 

Down from the day of Eden lost, 

A generation in a year. 
Unscathed by heat, unnipt by frost, 

True to the sovereign sun, appear 



THE WILD PINK. 



The units of thy transient race, 
Each in its turn, each in its place, 
To make the world a little while 
Lovelier and sweeter with its smile. 

How earnest thou hither ? from what soil. 

Where those that went before thee grew, 
Exempt from suffering, care, and toil. 

Clad by the sunbeams, fed with dew ? 
Tell me on what strange spot of ground 
Thy rock-born kindred yet are found, 
And I the carrier-dove will be 
To bring them wondrous news of thee. 

How, here, by wren or red-breast dropt, 

Thy parent-germ Avas left behind. 
Or, in its trackless voyage stopt. 

While sailing on th' autumnal wind, 
Not rudely wreckt, but safely thrown 
On yonder ledge of quarried stone. 
Where the blithe swallow builds and sings. 
And the pert sparrow pecks his wings. 

Then, by some glimpse of moonshine sped, 

Q,ueen Mab, methinks, alighting there, 
A span-long, hand-breadth terrace spread, 

A fairy-garden hung in air. 
Of Hchens, moss, and earthy mould, 
To rival Babylon's of old. 
In Avhich that single seed she nurst. 
Till forth its embryo-wilding burst. 

Now, like that solitary star. 

Last in the morn's resplendent crown. 
Or first emerging, faint and far. 

When evening-glooms the sky embrown, 
Thy beauty shines without defence, 
Yet safe from gentle violence. 
While infant-hands and maiden-eyes 
Covet in vain the tempting prize. 



Yon arch, beneath whose giant-span, 
Thousands of passing feet have trod 

Upon the dust that once was man, 
Gather'd around the house of God, 

•^That arch which seems to mock decay, 

Fix'd as the firmament to-day. 

Is fading hke the rainbow's form. 

Through the slow stress of time's long storm. 

But thou mayst boast perennial prime ; 

— The blade, the stem, the bud, the flower. 
Not ruin'd but renew'd by time, 

Beyond the great destroyer's power, 
Like day and night, like spring and fall, 
Alternate, on the abbey wall, 
May come and go, from year to year. 
And vanish but to re-appear. 

Nay, when in utter wreck are strown 

Arch, buttress, all this mighty mass. 
Crumbled, and crush'd, and overgrown 

With thorns and thistles, reeds and grass, 
While Nature thi/s the waste repairs. 
Thine offspring, Nature's endless heirs. 
Earth's ravaged fields may re-possess, 
And plant once more the wilderness. 

So be it : — but the sun is set. 

My song must end, and I depart ; 
Yet thee I never will forgot, 

But bear thee in my inmost Jieart, 
Where this shall thy memorial be, 
— If God so cares for thine and thee, 
How can I doubt that love divine. 
Which watches over me and mine ? 



PARTING WORDS. 

" And he said, Let me go, for the day breaketh." 

Genesis, xxxii. 

Let me go, the day is breaking, 

Dear companions, let me go ; 
We have spent a night of waking 

In the wilderness below ; 
Upward now I bend my way, 
Part we here at break of day. 

Let me go, I may not tarry, 

Wrestling thus with doubts and fears ; 
Angels wait my soul to carry. 

Where my risen Lord appears ; 
Friends and kindred, weep not so, 
If ye love me, let me go. 

We have travell'd long together, 

Hand in hand, and heart in heart, 
Both through fair and stormy weather. 

And 'tis hard — 'tis hard to part. 
Yet we must : — " Fareivelir'' to you ; 
Answer, one and all, '■'■ AdicAi T'' 
'Tis not darkness gathering round me. 

Which withdraws me from your sight ; 
Walls of flesh no more can bound me, 

But, translated into Hght, 
Like the lark on mounting wing, 
Though unseen, you hear me sing. 

Heaven's broad day hath o'er me broken, 
Far beyond earth's span of sky : 

Am I dead ? — Nay, by this token, 
Know that I have ceased to die ; 

Would you solve the mystery. 

Come up hither, — come and see. 



1837. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



THE ROSES. 

ADDRESSED TO A FRIEND ON THE BIRTH OF HIS FIRST CHILD. 

Two Roses on one slender spray- 
In sweet communion grew, 

Together hailed the morning ray, 
And drank the evening dew ; 

While sweetly wreath'd in mossy green. 
There sprang a little bud between. 

Through clouds and sunshine, storm and showers, 

They open'd into bloom, 
Mingling their foliage and their flowers. 

Their beauty and perfume ; 
While foster'd on its rising stem. 

The bud became a purple gem. 

But soon their summer splendour pass'd, 

They faded in the wind, 
Yet were these roses to the last 

The loveliest of their kind. 
Whose crimson leaves in falling round, 
Adorn'd and sanctified the ground. 

When thus were all their honours shorn, 

The bud unfolding rose. 
And blush'd and brighten'd, as the morn 

From dawn to sunrise glows, 
Till o'er each parent's drooping head. 
The daughter's crowning glory spread. 

My Friends ! in youth's romantic prime. 

The golden age of man, 
Like these twin Roses spend your time, 

— Life's htlle, lessening span ; 
Then be your breasts as free from cares. 

Your hours as innocent as theirs. 



ELIJAH IN THE WILDERNESS. 



And in the infant bud that blows 

In your encircling arms, 
Mark the dear promise of a rose, 

The pledge of future charms. 
That o'er your withering hours shall shine, 
Fair, and more fair, as you decline ;— 
Till, planted in that realm of rest 

Where roses never die, 
Amidst the gardens of the blest. 

Beneath a stormless sky. 
You flower afresh, like Aaron's rod, 
That blossom'd at the sig^ht of God. 



ELIJAH IN THE WILDERNESS. 

1 Kings xix. 
Thus pray'd the prophet in the wilderness ; 
"God of my fathers! look on my distress; 
My days are spent in vanity and strife, 
Oh that the Lord would please to take my life ! 
Beneath the clods through this lone valley spread. 
Fain would I join the generations dead !" 

Heaven deign'd no answer to that murmuring prayer, 
Silence that thrill'd the blood alone was there ; 
Down sunk his weary limbs, slow heaved his breath, 
And sleep fell on him with a weight hke death ; 
Dreams, raised by evil spirits, hover'd near, 
Throng'd with strange thoughts, and images of fear ; 
Th' abominations of the Gentiles came; — 
Detested Chemosh, Moloch clad with flame, 
Ashtaroth, queen of heaven, with moony crest. 
And Baiil, sunlike, high above the rest. 
Glared on him, gnash'd their teeth, then sped away, 
Like ravening vultures to their carrion-prey, 
Where every grove grew darker with their rites, 
And blood ran reeking down the mountain-heights : 



But to the living God, throughout the land, 
He saw no altar blaze, no temple stand; 
Jerusalem was dust, and Zion's hill. 
Like Tophct's valley, desolate and still : ^ 
The prophet drew one deep desponding groan, 
And his heart died within him like a stone. 

An angel's touch the dire entrancement broke, 
"Arise and eat, Elijah !" — He awoke. 
And found a table in the desert spread. 
With water in the cruise beside his head ; 
He bless'd the Lord, who turn'd away his prayer, 
And feasted on the heaven-provided fere ; 
Then sweeter slumber o'er his senses stole, 
And sunk hke hfe new-breathed into his soul. 
A dream brought David's city on his sight, 
— Shepherd's were watching o'er their flocks by night ; 
Around them uncreated splendour blazed, 
And heavenly hosts their hallelujah's raised; 
A theme unknown since sin to death gave birth, 
"Glory to God! good will and peace on earth!" 
They sang ; his heart responded to the strain. 
Though memory sought to keep the words in vain : 
The vision changed ; — amid the gloom serene, 
One star above all other stars was seen. 
It had a light, a motion of its own, 
And o'er an humble shed in Bethlehem shone ; 
He look'd, and, lo ! an infant newly born. 
That seem'd cast out to poverty and scorn. 
Yet Gentile kings its advent came to greet, 
Worshipp'd, and laid their treasures at its feet. 
Musing what this mysterious babe might be, 
He saw a sufferer stretch'd upon a tree ; 
Yet while the victim died, by men abhorr'd, 
Creation's agonies confess'd him Lord. 
Again the Angel smote the slumberer's side ; 
"Arise and eat, the way is long and wide." 
He rose and ate, and with unfainting force. 
Through forty days and nights upheld his course. 



ELIJAH IN THE WILDERNESS. 



Horeb, the mount of God, he reach'd, and lay- 
Within a cavern till the cool of day. 
" What dost thou here, Elijah ?" — Like the tide, 
Brake that deep voice through silence. He replied, 
♦' I have been very jealous for thy cause, 
Lord God of hosts ! for men make void thy laws ; 
Thy people have thrown down thine altars, slain 
Thy prophets, — I, and I alone, remain; 
My life with reckless vengeance they pursue. 
And what can I against a nation do ?" 

" Stand on the mount before the Lord, and know. 
That wrath or mercy at my will I show." 
Anon the power that holds the winds let fly 
Their devastating armies through the sky ; 
Then shook the wilderness, the rocks were rent, 
As when Jehovah bow'd the firmament. 
And trembling Israel, while he gave the law. 
Beheld the symbols but no image saw. 
The storm retired, nor left a trace behind ; 
The Lord pass'd by ; he came not with the wind. 

Beneath tiie prophet's feet the shuddering ground 
Clave, and disclosed a precipice profound, 
Like that which open'd to the gates of hell, 
When Korah, Dathan, and Abiram fell ; 
Again the Lord pass'd by, but unreveal'd ; 
He came not with the earthquake, — all was seal'd. 

A new amazement ! vale and mountain turn'd 
Red as the battle-field with blood, then burn'd 
Up to the stars, as terrible a flame 
As shall devour this universal frame ; 
Elijah watch'd it kindle, spread, expire ; 
The Lord pass'd by ; he came not with the fire. 

A still small whisper breathed upon his ear; 
He wrapt his mantle round his face with fear ; 
Darkness that might be felt involved him, — dumb 
With expectation of a voice to come. 
He stood upon the threshold of the cave. 
As one long dead, just risen from the grave, 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



In the last judgment. — Came the voice and cried, 
" What dost thou here, Elijah ?" — He replied, 
" I have been very jealous for thy cause, 
Lord God of hosts ! for men make void thy laws 
Thy people have thrown down thine altars, slain 
Thy prophets, — I, and I alone, remain ; 
My life with ruthless violence they pursue. 
And what can I against a nation do ?" 

" My day of vengeance is at hand : the year 
Of my redeem'd shall suddenly appear : 
Go Thou, — anoint two kings, — and in thy place, 
A prophet to stand up before my face : 
Then he who 'scapes the Syrian's sword shall fall 
By his whom to Samaria's throne I call ; 
And he who 'scapes from Jehu, in that day. 
Him shall the judgment of Elisha slay. 
Yet hath a remnant been preserved by me, 
Seven thousand souls, who never bovir'd the knee 
To Baal's image, nor have kiss'd his shrine ; 
These are my jewels, and they shall be mine. 
When to the world my righteousness is shown, 
And, root and branch, idolatry o'erthrown." 

So be it, God of truth ! yet why delay ? 
With thee a thousand years are as one day ; 
O crown thy people's hopes, dispel their fears ! 
And be to-day with Thee a thousand years ! 
Cut short the evil, bring the blessed time. 
Avenge thine own elect from clime to clime ; 
Let not an idol in thy path be spared. 
All share the fate which Baiil long hath shared ; 
Nor let seven thousand only worship Thee ; 
Make every tongue confess, bow every knee ; 
Now o'er the promised kingdoms reign thy Son, 
One Lord through all the earth, — his name be one! 
Hast Thou not spoken? shall it not be done ? 



STANZAS 

ON THE DEATH OF 

THE LATE REV. THOMAS RAWSON TAYLOR, 

» OF BRADFORD, IN YORKSHIRE; 

A young minister of great promise, and a poet of no mean order, whose verses, 
entitled " Communion ■with the Dead," on Hie removal in early life of a sister, 
would endear and perpetuate the remembrance (if both, were they as generally 
known as they deserve to be. The survivor died on the 7th of March, 1835, 
aged 28 years. 

Millions of eyes have wept o'er frames 

Once living, beautiful, and young, 
Now dust and ashes, and their names 

Extinct on earth because unsung : 
Yet song itself hath but its day, 
Like the swan's dirge, — a dying lay. 

A dying lay I would rehearse. 

In memory of one whose breath 
Pour'd forth a stream of such sweet verse 

As might have borne away from death 
The trophy of a sister's name, 
— Winning at once and giving fame. 

But all is mortal here, — that song 

Pass'd like the breeze, which steals from flowers 
Their fragrance, yet repays the wrong 

With dew-drops, shaken down in showers ; 
Ah ! like those flowers with dew-drops fed. 
They sprang, they blossom'd, they are dead. 

The poet (spared a little while) 

FoUow'd the sister all too soon ; 
The hectic rose that flush'd his smile 

Grew pale and wither'd long ere noon ; 
In youth's exulting prime he gave 
What death demanded to the grave. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



But that which death nor grave could seize, — 

His soul, — into his Saviour's hands 
(Who by the cross's agonies 

Redeem'd a people from all lands) 
He yielded, till " that day"* to keep, 
And then, like Stephen, fell asleep. 
"That day" will come, meamvhile weep not, 

O ye that loved him ! and yet more 
Love him for grief that " he is not :" 

— Rather with joy let eyes run o'er, 
And warm hearts hope his face to sec. 
Where 'tis for ever " good to be." 



CHRIST THE PURIFIER. 

Malaciii, iii. 2, 3. 

He that from dross would win the precious ore. 
Bends o'er the crucible an earnest eye. 

The subtle, searching process to explore. 

Lest the one brilliant moment should pass by. 

When in the molten silver's virgin mass. 

He meets his pictured face as in a glass. 

Thus in God's furnace are his children tried ; 

Thrice happy they who to the end endure ! 
But who the fiery trial may abide ? 

Who from the crucible come forth so pure. 
That He, whose eyes of flame look through the whole, 
May see his image perfect in the soul ? 
Not with an evanescent ghmpse alone. 

As in that mirror the refiner's face. 
But, stampt with heaven's broad signet, there be shown 

Immanuel's features, full of truth and grace, — 
And round that seal of love this motto be, 
"Not for a moment, but eternity !" 




A CERTAIN DISCIPLE.' 



ON THE PORTRAIT OF THE REV. W. M. 

Long may his living countenance express 
The air and h'neaments of holiness, 
And, as from theme to theme his thoughts shall range 
In high discourse, its answering aspects change ! 
— Like Abraham's, faith's sublimest pledge display, 
When liound upon the altar Isaac lay ; 
— Kindle like Jacob's, when he felt his power 
With God, and wrestled till the day-break hour ; 
— Shine like the face of Moses, when he came. 
All-radiant, from the mount that bum'd with flame ; 
— Flash like Elisha's, when, his sire in view, 
He caught the mantle and the spirit too ; 
— Darken like Jonah's, when with " Wo !" he went 
Through trembling Nineveh, yet cry " Repent !'' 
— Brighten like Stephen's, when his foes amazed, 
As if an angel stood before them, gazed ; 
And hke that martyr's, at his latest breath, 
Reflect his Saviour's image full in death. 
Yea, ever in the true disciple's mien, 
His meek and lowly Master must be seen, 
And in the fervent preacher's boldest word. 
That voice which was the voice of mercy heard : 
— So may the love which drew, as with a chain, 
The Son of God from heaven, his heart constrain, 
.Draw him from earth, and fix his hopes above. 
While with the self-same chain, that chain of love, 
In new captivity, he strives to bind 
Sin's ransom'd slaves, his brethren of mankind ; 
Labouring and suffering still, whate'er the cost. 
By hfe or death, to seek and save the lost ; 



«ra MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 

That, following Christ, in pure simplicity, 
As He was in this world, himself may be, 
Till, call'd with Him in glory to sit down. 
And with the crown then given the Giver crown. 

1834. 



THE COMMUNION OF SAINTS. 

John xvii. 20—23. 

Free, yet in chains the mountains stand, 

Th.e valleys link'd run hand in hand, 

In fellowship the forests thrive. 

And streams from streams their strength derive. 

The cattle graze in flocks and herds, 
In choirs and concerts sing the birds. 
Insects by millions ply the wing. 
And flowers in peaceful armies spring. 

All nature is society. 

All nature's voices harmony. 

All colours blend to form pure hght, 

— Why then should Christians not unite? 

Thus to the Father pray'd the Son, 
" One may they be as We are one ; 
That I in them, and Thou in Me, 
They one with Us may ever be." 

Children of God ! combine your bands. 
Brethren in Christ ! join hearts and hands. 
And pray, — for so the Father will'd, — 
That the Son's prayer may be fulfill'd : — 

Fulfill'd in you, fulfill'd in all 
That on the name of Jesus call. 
And every covenant of love 
Ye bind on earth, be bound above ! 



PERILS BY THE HEATHEN.' 



PERILS BY THE HEATHEN.' 

2 Corinthians xi. 26. 



Lines in memory of the Rev. William Thkelfall, Wesleyan Missionary, who, 
witli two native converts, (Jacob Links and Johannes Jagger,) set out in 
June, 1825, to carry the gos|)el into great Naniaqiia-land, on the western coast 
of South Africa. The last communication received from liim by his brethren 
was the following brief note, d.ited " JVann Baths, August 6, 1825. Being 
rather unkindly handled by this people, in tlieir nut finding or not permitting 
us to have a guide, we returned hither yesterday, after having been to the 
north four days' journey, and losingone of the oxen. I feel great need of your 
prayers, and my patience is much tried. These people are very unfeeling and 
deceitful ; but, thank Cod, we are all in good health, though we doubt of suc- 
cess. Our cattle are so poor that they cannot, 1 think, bring us home again ; 
but we shall yet try to get further ; and then it is not unlikely, I shall despatch 
Johannes to you to send oxen to fetch us away. Do not be uneasy about us; 
we all feel much comforted in our souls, and the Lord give us patience. We 
are obliged to beg hard to buy meat. Peace be with you ! — William Threl- 
tall. 

No further intelligence arrived concerning the wanderers for seven months, 
except unauthorized rumours, that they had, in some way, perished in the 
desert. In the sequel it was ascertained, that Mr. Threlfall and his faithful 
companions had left the Warm Baths above mentioni'd about the 9lh or 10th 
of August, having obtained a vagabond guide to the Great Fish River. This 
wretch, meeting with two others as wicked as himself, conducted them to a 
petty kraal of Bushmen, (the outcasts of all the CafTre tribes,) and there mur- 
dered them in the night after they had lain down to sleep, for the sake of the 
few trifling articles which they carried with them for the purchase of food by 
the way. Two of the assassins were long afterwards taken by some of their 
own wild countrymen, and by them delivered up to the colonial authorities. 
One of these \*'as the arch-traitor, called Naangaap, who with his own hand 
hurled the stone which caused the death of the missionary. He was tried at 
Clanwilliam, and condemned to be shot. On their way to the place appointed 
for execution, the escort halted at Lily Fountain, where the relatives of his 
murdered companion, Jacob Links, resided. These came out of their dwellings 
and spoke to the criminal upon his awful situation, of which he seemed little 
heedful. RIartha, Jacob's sister, was especially concerned to awaken him to 
a sense of his guilt and peril, saying to him, with true Christian meekness and 
sympathy, — "I am indeed very sorry fur yon, though you have killed my bro- 
tlier, because you are indifferent about the salvation of your own sinful soul." 
On the 30th of .September, 1827, he was shot, according to his sentence, by six 
men of his own tribe, at Silver Fountain, on the border of the colony, with the 
entire concurrence of the chief, who had come from his distant residence to 
witness the execution. 

Mr. Threlfall was a young man who had served on several missionary stations 
in South Africa, from the year 1822, under great bodily affliction for the most 
part of the time, but with unquenchable fervency of spirit, and devotion tpthe 
work of God among the heathen. His two fellow-labourers and fellow-suf- 
ferers, Jacob Links and Johannes Jagger, had voluntarily offered themselves 



174 MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 

to the same service and sacrifice willi Iiiiri, for the sake of carrying the gospel 
of the grace of God to their Ijeiiife'hted countrymen in the farther regions of 
Namaqua-land. 

Not by the lion's paw, the serpent's tooth, 

By sudden sun-stroke, or by slow decay, 
War, famine, plague, — meek messenger of truth ! — 

Wert thou arrested on thy pilgrim-way. 

The sultry whirlwind spared thee in its Avrath, 
The lightning flash'd before thee, and pass'd by. 

The brooding earthquake paused beneath thy path, 
The mountain-torrent shunn'd thee, or ran dry. 

Thy march was through the savage wilderness. 
Thine errand thither, hke thy gracious Lord's, 

To seek and save the lost, to heal and bless 
Its blind and lame, diseased and dying hordes. 

How did the love of Christ, that, like a chain. 

Drew Christ himself to Bethlehem from his throne, 

And bound Him to the cross, thine heart constrain. 
Thy willing heart, to make that true love known ! 

But not to build, was thine appointed part. 
Temple where temple never stood before ; 

Yet was it well the thought was in thine heart, 

— Thou know'st it now, — thy Lord required no more. 

The wings of darkness round thy tent were sf^read. 
The wild beast's bowlings brake not thy repose ; 

The silent stars were watching overhead. 

Thy friends were nigh thee, — nigh thee were thy foes. 

The sun went down upon thine evening prayer. 

He rose upon thy finish'd sacrifice ; 
The house of God, the gate of heaven, was there ; 

Angels and fiends on thee had fix'd their eyes. 

At midnight, in a moment, open stood 

Th' eternal doors to give thy spirit room ; 
At morn the earth had drunk thy guiltless blood, 

— But where on earth may now be found thy tomb ? 



A MIDNIGHT THOUGHT. 

At rest beneath the ever-shifting sand, 
This thine unsculptured epitaph remain, 

Till the last trump shall summon sea and land, 
" To me to hve was Christ ; to die was gain." 

And must with thee thy slain companions lie, 
Unmourn'd, unsung, forgotten where they fell? 

Oh ! for the spirit and power of prophecy. 

Their life, their death, the fruits of both to tell ! 

They took the cross, they bore it, they lay down 

Beneath it, woke, and found that cross their crown. 

O'er their lost relics, on the spot where guilt 
Slew sleeping innocence, and hid the crime, 

A church of Christ, amidst the desert built, 
May gather converts till the end of time. 

And there, with them, their kindred, dust to dust, 

Await *he resurrection of the just. 



A MIDNIGHT TH0UC4HT. 

In a land of strange delight, 
My transported spirit stray'd ; 

1 awake where all is night. 
Silence, solitude, and shade. 

Is the dream of Nature flown ? 

Is the universe destroy'd, 
Man extinct, and I alone 

Breathing through the formless void ? 

No : — my soul, in God rejoice ! 

Through the gloom his light I see, 
In the silence hear his voice, 

And. his hand is over me. • 

When I slumber in the tomb, 

He will guard my resting-place : 
Fearless in the day of doom 

May I stand before his face ! 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



1 



THE PEAK MOUNTAINS : 



IN TWO PARTS. 



■WRITTEN AT BUXTON, IN AUGUST, 1812. 



It may be useful to remark, that the scenery in the neighbourhood of Buxton, 
when surveyed from any of tlie surrounding eminences, consists chiefly of 
numerous and naked liills, of which many are yet unenclosed, and the rest 
poorly cultivated ; the whole district, except in the immediate precincts of the 
Baths and the village of Fairfield, being miserably bare of both trees and houses. 



Health on these open hills I seek, 

By these delicious springs, in vain : 
The rose on this deserted cheek 

Shall never bloom again ; 
For youth is fled ; — and less by time 

Than sorrow torn away. 
The pride, the strength of manhood's prime, 

Falls to decay. 

Restless and fluttering to expire, 

Life's vapour sheds a cold dim light, 
Frail as the evanescent fire 

Amidst the murky night. 
That tempts the traveller from afar 

To follow, o'er the heath, 
Its baleful and bewildering star 

Tp snares of death. 

A dreary torpor numbs my brain ; 

Now shivering pale, — now flush'd with heat 
Hurried, then slow, from vein to vein 

Unequal pulses beat ; 



THE PEAK MOUNTAINS. 



Quick palpitations heave my heart, 

Anon it seems to sink ; 
Alarm'd at sudden sounds I start, 

From shadows shrink. 

Bear me, my failing limbs ! Oh, bear 

A melancholy sufferer forth, 
To breathe abroad the mountain air 

Fresh from the vigorous north ; 
To view the prospect, waste and wild, 

Tempestuous or serene. 
Still dear to me, as to the child 

The mother's mien. 

Ah ! who can look on Nature's face, 

And feel unholy passions move ? 
Her forms of majesty and grace 

I cannot choose but love : 
Her frowns or smiles my woes disarm. 

Care and repining cease ; 
Her terrors awe, her beauties charm 

My thoughts to peace. 

Already through mine inmost soul, 

A deep tranquillity I feel, 
O'er every nerve, with mild control, 

Her consolations steal ; 
This fever'd frame and fretful mind, 

Jarring midst doubts and fears, 
Are soothed to harmony : — I find 

Delight in tears. 

I quit the path, and track with toil 

The mountains' unfrequented maze ; 
Deep moss and heather clothe the soil. 

And many a springlet plays. 
That welling from its secret source 

Down rugged dells is tost. 
Or spreads through rushy fens its course, 

Silently lost. 



The flocks and herds, that freely range 

These moorlands, turn a jealous eye, 
As if the form of man were strange, 

To watch me stealing by ; 
The heifer stands aloof to gaze, 

The colt comes boldly on : — 
I pause, — he shakes his forelock, neighs, 

Starts, and is gone._ 

I seek the valley : — all alone 

I seem in this sequester'd place ; 
Not so ; I meet, unseen, yet known. 

My Maker face to face ; 
My heart perceives his presence nigh, 

And hears his voice proclaim. 
While bright his glory passes by. 

His noblest name. 

LOVE is that name,— for GOD is LOVE ; 

— Here, where unbuilt by mortal hands. 
Mountains below and heaven above. 

His awful temple stands, 
I worship: — "Lord ! though I am dust 

And ashes in thy sight. 
Be thou my strength ; in Thee I trust : 

Be thou my light." 



Emerging from the cavern'd glen. 

From steep to steep I slowly climb, 
And far above the haunts of men, 

I tread in air sublime : 
Beneath my path the swallows sweep ; 

Yet higher craggs impend, 
And wild flowers from the fissures peep, 

And rills descend. 

Now on the ridges bare and bleak, 
Cool round my temples sighs the gale 



THE PEAK MOUNTAINS. 



Ye winds ! that wander o'er the Peak ; 

Ye mountain-spirits ! hail ! 
Angels of health ! to man below 

Ye bring celestial airs ; 
Bear back to Him, from whom ye blow, 

Our praise and prayers. 

Here, like the eagle from his nest, 

I take my proud and dizzy stand ; 
Here, from the cliff's sublimest crest, 

Look down upon the land : 
Oh ! for the eagle's eye to gaze 

Undazzled through this light ! 
Oh ! for the eagle's wings to raise 

O'er all my flight. 

The sun in glory walks the skj^, 

White fleecy clouds are floating round, 
Whose shapes along the landscape fly, 

— Here, chequering o'er the ground ; 
There, down the glens the shadows sweep, 

With changing lights between ; 
Yonder they climb the upland steep, 

Shifting the scene. 

Above, beneath, immensely spread. 

Valleys and hoary rocks I vieAv, 
Heights over heights exalt their head, 

Of many a sombre hue ; 
No waving woods their flanks adorn, 

No hedge-rows, gay with trees, 
Encircle fields, where floods of corn 

Roll to the breeze. 

My soul this vast horizon fills. 

Within whose undulated fine 
Thick stand the multitude of hills, 

And clear the waters shine ; 
Gray mossy walls the slopes ascend ; 

While roads, that tire the eye, 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



Upward their winding course extend, 
And touch the sky. 

With rude diversity of form, 

The insulated mountains tower ; • 
— Oft o'er these cliffs the transient storm 

And partial darkness lower, 
While yonder summits far away 

Shine sweetly through the gloom, 
Like glimpses of eternal day 

Beyond the tomb. 

Hither, of old, the Almighty came ; 

Clouds were his car, his steeds the wind : 
Before Him went devouring flame. 

And thunder roll'd behind ; 
At his approach the mountains reel'd 

Like vessels to and fro ; 
Earth, heaving like a sea, reveal'd 

The gulfs below. 

Borne through the wilderness in wrath, 

He seem'd in power alone a God ; 
But blessings follow'd in his path. 

For Mercy seized his rod ; 
She smote the rock, — and as He pass'd, 

Forth gush'd a living stream ; 
The fire, the earthquake, and the blast 

Fled as a dream. 

Behold the everlasting hills. 

In that convulsion scatter'd round ; 
Hark ! from their caves the issuing rills 

With sweetest music sound ; 
Ye lame and impotent ! draw near ; 

With healing on her wing, 
The cherub Mercy watches here 

Her ancient spring. 



TO ANN AND JANE : 

VERSES WRITTEN ON A BLANK LEAF IN THE SMALL VOLUME OF 

HYMNS FOR INFANT MINDS. 

When the shades of night retire 
From the morn's advancing beams, 
Ere the hills are tipt with fire, 
And the radiance hghts the streams, 
Lo, the lark begins her song, 
Early on the wing, and long. 

Summon'd by the signal notes, 
Soon her sisters quit the laAvn, 
With their wildly warbling throats, 
Soaring in the dappled dawn ; 
Brighter, warmer spread the rays. 
Louder, sweeter swell their lays. 

Nestlings, in their grassy beds. 
Hearkening to the joyful sound. 
Heavenward point their little heads, 
Lowly twittering from the ground, 
Ere their wings are fledged to fly, 
To the chorus in the sky. 

Thus, fair Minstrels, while ye sing, 
Teaching infant minds to raise 
To the universal King 
Humble hymns of prayer and praise, 
O may all Avho hear your voice 
Look, and listen, and rejoice ! 

Faltering like the skylark's young, 
While your numbers they record. 
Soon may every heart and tongue 
Learn to magnify the Lord ; 
And your strains divinely sweet, 
Unborn millions thus repeat. 



Minstrels! what reward is due 
For this labour of your love ? 
— Through eternity may You, 
In the Paradise above, 
Round the dear Redeemer's feet, 
All your infant readers meet ! 



TRANSMIGRATIONS. 



A HAiL-STONE, from the cloud set free. 

Shot, slanting coastward, o'er the sea, 

And thus, as eastern tales relate, 

Lamented its untimely fate : 

" Last moment born, condemn'd in this, 

The next absorpt in yon abyss ; 

'Twere better ne'er to know the light, 

Than see and perish at first sight." 

— An oyster heard, and as it fell, 

Welcomed the outcast to her shell, 

Where meekly suffering that "sea-change," 

It grew to " something rich and strange," 

And thence became the brightest gem 

That decks the Sultan's diadem, 

Turn'd from a particle of ice 

Into a pearl of priceless price. 

— Thus can the power that rules o'er all 

Exalt the humble by their fall. 

A dew-drop, in the flush of morn. 
Sparkled upon a blossom'd thorn, 
Reflecting from its mirror pure 
The sun himself in miniature. 
Dancing for gladness on the spray, 
It miss'd its hold, and slid away ; 
A lark, just mounting up to sing. 
Caught the frail trembler on its wing, 



But, borne aloft through gathering clouds, 
Left it entangled with their shrouds : 
Lost, and for ever lost, it seem'd. 
When suddenly the sun forth gleam'd, 
And round the showery vapours threw 
A rainbow, — where our drop of dew 
Midst the prismatic hues of heaven 
Outshone the beams of all the seven. 
When virtue falls, 'tis not to die. 
But be translated to the sky. 

A babe into existence came, 
A feeble, helpless, suffering frame ; 
It breathed on earth a little while, 
Then vanish' d, like a tear, a smile, 
That springs and falls, — that peers and parts. 
The grief, the joy of loving hearts ; 
The grave received the body dead 
Where all that live must find their bed. 
Sank then the soul to dust and gloom, 
Worms and corruption in the tomb ? 
No, — midst the rainbow round the throne, 
Caught up to paradise, it shone, 
And yet shall shine, until the day 
When heaven and earth must pass away. 
And those that sleep in Jesus here. 
With him in glory shall appear. 
Then shall that soul and body meet ; 
And when his jewels are complete. 
Midst countless millions, form a gem 
In the Redeemer's diadem. 
Wherewith as thorns his brows once bound, 
He for his sufferings shall be crown'd ; 
Raised from the ignominious tree 
To the right-hand of Majesty, 
Head over all created things. 
The Lord of lords, the King of kings. 



CHATTERTON. 



Stanzas on reading the Verses entitled " Resignation," written by Chatterton, 
a few days before bis inclanclioly end. 



A DYING swan of Pindus sings 

In wildly mournful strains ; 
As Death's cold fingers snap the strings, 

His suffering lyre complains. 

Soft as the mist of evening wends 

Along the shadowy vale ; 
Sad as in storms the moon ascends, 

And turns the darkness pale ; 

So soft the melting numbers flow 

From his harmonious lips ; 
So sad his wo-wan features show. 

Just fading in echpse. 

The Bard, to dark despair resign'd. 

With his expiring art, 
Sings, midst the tempest of his mind. 

The shipwreck of his heart. 

If Hope still seem to hnger nigh. 

And hover o'er his head. 
Her pinions are too weak to fly. 

Or Hope ere now had fled. 

Rash Minstrel ! who can hear thy songs. 

Nor long to share thy fire ? 
Who read thine errors and thy wrongs. 

Nor execrate the lyre ? 

The lyre, that sunk thee to the grave, 
When burstincr into bloom, 




That lyre the power to Genius gave 

To blossom in the tomb. 
Yes ; — till his memory fail with years, 

Shall Time thy straias recite ; 
And while thy story swells his tears, 

Thy song shall charm his flight. 



1602. 



A DAUGHTER (C. M.) TO HER MOTHER, 

ON HER BIRTH-DAY, NOVEMBER 25, 1811. 

This the day to me most dear 
In the changes of the year ; 
Spring, the fields and woods adorning, 
Spring may boast a gayer morning ; 
Summer noon, with brighter beams. 
Gild the mountains and the streams ; 
Autumn, through the twilight vale. 
Breathe a more delicious gale : 
Yet though stern November reigns 
Wild and wintry o'er the plains, 
Never does the morning rise 
Half so welcome to mine eyes ; 
Noontide glories never shed 
Rays so beauteous round my head ; 
Never looks the evening scene 
So enchantingly serene. 
As on this returning day, 
When, in spirit rapt away, 
Joys and sorrows I have known. 
In the years for ever flown, 
Wake at every sound and sight. 
Reminiscence of delight : 
All around me, all above. 
Witnessing a Mother's love. 



Love, that watch'd my early years 
With conflicting liopcs and fears ; 
Love, that through life's flowery May 
Led my childhood, prone to stray ; 
Love, that still directs my youth 
With the constancy of Truth, 
Heightens every bliss it shares, 
Softens and divides the cares. 
Smiles away my light distress, 
Weeps for joy, or tenderness : 
— May that love, to latest age, 
Cheer my earthly pilgrimage ; 
May that love, o'er death victorious. 
Rise beyond the grave more glorious ; 
Souls, united here, would be 
One to all eternitj'-. 

When these eyes, from native night, 
First unfolded to the light, 
On what object, fair and new. 
Did they fix their fondest view ? 
On my Mother's smiling mien ; 
All the mother there Avas seen. 
When their weary lids Avould close, 
And she sang me to repose. 
Found I not the sweetest rest 
On my Mother's peaceful breast ? 
When my tongue from hers had caught 
Sounds to utter infant thought, 
Readiest then what accents came ? 
Those that meant my Mother's name. 
When my timid feet begun. 
Strangely pleased, to stand or run, 
'Twas my Mother's voice and eye 
Most encouraged me to try. 
Safe to run, and strong to stand, 
Holding by her gentle hand. 

Time since then hath deeper made 
Lines, where youthful dimples play'd. 



A DAUGHTER (c, M.) TO HER MOTHER. 

Yet to me my Mother's face 
Wears a more angelic grace ; 
And her tresses, thin and hoary, 
Are they not a crown of glory ? 
—Cruel griefs have wrung that bieast, 
Once my Paradise of rest ; 
While in these I bear a part, 
Warmer grows my Mother's heart. 
Closer our affections twine, 
Mine with hers, and hers with mine. 
— Many a name, since hers I knew, 
Have I loved with honour due. 
But no name shall be more dear 
Than my Mother's to mine ear. 
— Many a hand that Friendship phghted. 
Have I clasp'd with all dehghted. 
But more faithful none can be 
Than my Mother's hand to me. 
Thus by every tie endear'd, 
Thus with fiUal reverence fear'd, 
Mother ! on this day 'tis meet 
That, with salutation sweet, 
I should wish you years of health, 
Worldly happiness and wealth. 
And when good old age is past. 
Heaven's eternal peace at last ! 
But with these I frame a vow 
For a double blessing now ; 
One, that richly shall combine 
Your fehcity with mine ; 
One, in which with soul and voice. 
Both together may rejoice ; 
Oh ! what shall that blessing be ? 
— Dearest Mother ! may you see 
All your prayers fulfill'd for me ! 



98» MISCELLANEOUS POEMS, 

ON FINDING THE FEATHERS OF A LINNET 

SCATTERED ON THE GROUND IN A SOLITARY WALK. 

Thkse little relics, hapless bird ! 

That strew the lonely vale, 
With silent eloquence record 

Thy melancholy tale. 

Like Autumn's leaves, that rustle round 

From every withering tree, 
These plumes, dishevell'd o'er the ground, 

Alone remain of thee. 

Some hovering kite's rapacious maw 

Hath been thy timeless grave : 
No pitying eye thy murder saw, 

No friend appear'd to save. 

Heaven's thunder smite the guilty foe ! 

No : — spare the tyrant's breath. 
Till wintry winds, and famine slow, 

Avenge thy cruel death ! 

But every feather of thy wing 

Be quicken'd where it lies. 
And at the soft return of spring, 

A fragrant cowslip rise ! 

Few were thy days, thy pleasures few. 

Simple and unconfmed ; 
On sunbeams every moment flew, 

Nor left a care behind. 

In spring to build thy curious nest. 

And woo thy merry bride, 
Carol and fly, and sport and rest, 

Was all thy humble pride. 

Happy beyond the lot of kings. 
Thy bosom knew no smart, 



Till the last pang, that tore the strings 
From thy dissever'd heart. 

When late to secret griefs a prey. 

I wander'd slowly here, 
Wild from the copse an artless lay, 

Like magic, won mine ear. 

Perhaps 'twas thy last evening song, 

That exquisitely stole 
In sweetest melody along, 

And harmonized my soul. 

Now, blithe musician ! now no more, 

Thy mellow pipe resounds. 
But jarring drums at distance roar. 

And yonder howl the hounds : 

The hounds that through the echoing wood 

The panting hare pursue ; 
The drums, that wake the cry of blood, 

The voice of Glory too ! 

Here at my feet thy frail remains, 

Unwept, unburied, lie, 
Like victims on embattled plains, 

Forsaken where they die. 

Yet could the muse whose strains rehears? 

Thine unregarded doom. 
Enshrine thee in immortal verse, 

Kings should not scorn thy tomb. 

Though brief as thine my tuneful date. 
When wandering near this spot. 

The sad memorials of thy fate 
Shall never be forgot. 

While doom'd the lingering pangs to fee] 

Of many a nameless fear. 
One truant sigh from these I'll steal. 

And drop one willing tear. 



25 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



OCCASIONAL ODE 

FOR THE ANNIVERSARY OF THE ROYAL BRITISH SYSTEM OF 
EDUCATION, 

HELD AT freemason's HALL, MAY 16, 1812. 

The lion, o'er his wild domains. 

Rules with the terror of his eye ; 
The eagle of the rock maintains 

By force his empire in the sky ; 
The shark, the tyrant of the flood, 

Reigns through the deep with quenchless rage : 
Parent and young, unwean'd from blood. 

Are still the same from age to age. 

Of all that live, and move, and breathe, 

Man only rises o'er his birth ; 
He looks above, around, beneath. 

At once the heir of heaven and earth : 
Force, cunning, speed, which Nature gave 

The various tribes throughout her plan, 
Life to enjoy, from death to save, — 

These are the lowest powers of Man. 

From strength to strength he travels on : 

He leaves the hngering brute behind; 
And when a few short years are gone, 

He soars, a disembodied mind : 
Beyond the grave, his course subhme 

Destined through nobler paths to run. 
In his career the end of Time 

Is but Eternity begun. 

What guides him in his high pursuit. 

Opens, illumines, cheers his way, 
Discerns the immortal from the brute, 
. God's image from the mould of clay ? 



DEPARTED DAYS. 



'Tis knowledge : — Knowledge to the soul 
Is power, and liberty, and peace ; 

And while celestial ages roll. 

The joys of Knowledge shall increase. 

Hail ! to the glorious plan, that spread 

The hghtwith universal beams, 
And through the human desert led 

Truth's living, pure, perpetual streams, 
— Behold a new creation rise, 

New spirit breathed into the clod, 
Where'er the voice of Wisdom cries, 

" Man, know thyself, and fear thy God.' 



DEPARTED DAYS 

A RHAPSODY. 



WRITTEN ON VISITING FULNECK, IN YORKSHIRE, WHERE THE AUTHOR 
WAS EDUCATED, IN THE SPRING OF 1806. 

Days of my childhood, hail ! 

Whose gentle spirits wandering here, 

Do\vn in the visionary vale. 

Before mine eyes appear. 

Benignly pensive, beautifully pale ; 

O days for ever fled, for ever dear. 

Days of my childhood, hail ! 

Joys of my early hours ! 

The swallows on the wing. 

The bees among the flowers. 

The butterflies of spring. 

Light as their lovely moments flew. 
Were not more gay, more innocent than you : 

And fugitive as they. 

Like butterflies in spring. 

Like bees among the flowers. 

Like swallows on the wing. 
How swift, how soon ye pass'd away, 

Joys of my early hours ! 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



The loud Atlantic ocean, 

On Scotland's rugged breast, 

Rocks, with harmonious motion, 

His weary waves to rest, 

And gleaming round her emerald isles, 

In all the pomp of sunset smiles. 

On that romantic shore 

My parents hail'd their first-born boy : 

A mother's pangs my mother bore. 

My father felt a father's joy : 

My father, mother, — parents now no more : 

Beneath the Lion-Star they sleep. 

Beyond the western deep, 
And when the sun's noon-glory crests the waves, 
He shines without a shadow on their graves. 

Sweet seas, and smiling shores ! 

When no tomado-demon roars, 

Resembling that celestial chme 

Where, Avith the spirits of the blest. 

Beyond the hurricanes of Time, 

From all their toils my parents rest ; 

Their skies, eternally serene, 

Diffuse ambrosial balm 

Through sylvan isles for ever green, 

O'er seas for ever calm ; 
While saints and angels, kindling in his rays. 
On the full glory of the Godhead gaze. 
And taste and prove, in that transporting sight, 
Joy without sorrow, without darkness light. 

Light without darkness, without sorrow joy. 
On earth are all unknown to man ; 
Here, while I roved, a heedless boy. 
Here, while through paths of peace I ran. 
My feet were vex'd with puny snares, 
My bosom stung with insect-cares : 
But ah ! what light and little things 
Are childhood's woes ! — they break no rest ; 



DEPARTED DAYS. 



Like dew-drops on the skylark's wings, 
While slumbering in his grassy nest, 
Gone in a moment when he springs 
To meet the morn with open breast, 
As o'er the eastern hills her banners glow. 
And veil'd in mist the valley sleeps below. 

Like him on these dehghtful plains, 
I taught, with fearless voice, 
The echoing woods to sound my strains. 
The mountains to rejoice, 
Hail ! to the trees beneath whose shade, 
Rapt into worlds unseen I stray'd ; 
Hail ! to the stream that purl'd along 
In hoarse accordance to my song ; 
My song that pour'd uncensured lays. 
Tuned to a dying Saviour's praise. 
In numbers simple, wild, and sweet. 
As were the flowers beneath my feet ; — 
Those flowers are dead, 
Those numbers fled, 
Yet o'er my secret thought. 
From cold Oblivion's silent gloom. 
Their music to mine ear is brought. 
Like voices from the tomb. 
And yet in this untainted breast 
No baleful passion burn'd. 
Ambition had not banish'd rest. 
Nor hope had earthward turn'd ; 
Proud Reason still in shadow lay, 
And in my firmament alone. 
Forerunner of the day. 
The dazzling star of wonder shone, 
By whose enchanting ray 
Creation open'd on my earhest view, 
And all was beautiful, for all was new. 

Too soon my mind's awakening powers 
Made the light slumbers flee. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



Then vanish'd with the golden hours, 

The morning dreams of Infancy ; 
Sweet were those slumbers, dear those dreams to me; 
And yet to mournful memory lingering here. 
Sweet are those slumbers, and those dreams are dear : 
For hither, from my native clime. 
The hand that leads Orion forth, 
And wheels Arcturus round the north. 
Brought me, in Life's exulting prime : 
— Blest be that hand ! — Whether it shed 
Mercies or judgments on my head. 
Extend the sceptre or exalt the rod, — 
Blest be that hand ! — It is the hand of GOD.» 



THE BIBLE. 



What is the world ! — A Avildering maze. 
Where sin hath track' d ten thousand ways. 

Her victims to ensnare ; 
AJl broad, and winding, and aslope. 
All tempting with perfidious hope. 

All ending in despair. 

Millions of pilgrims throng those roads, 
Bearing their baubles, or their loads, 

Down to eternal night ; 
— One humble path, that never bends. 
Narrow, and rough, and steep, ascends 

From darkness into light. 

Is there a Guide to show that path ? 
The Bible : — He alone, who hath 

The Bible, need not stray : 
Yet he who hath, and will not give 
That heavenly Guide to all that live. 

Himself shall lose the way. 



I 



THE WILD ROSE: 

ON PLUCKING ONE LATE IN THE MONTH OF OCTOBER. 

Thou last pale promise of the waning year, 

Poor sickly Rose ! what dost thou here ? 

Why, frail flower ! so late a comer, 

Hast thou slept away the summer ? 

Since now, in Autumn's sullen reign, 

When ev'ry breeze 

Unrobes the trees, 

And strews their annual garments on the plain. 

Awaking from repose. 

Thy fairy lids unclose. 

Feeble, evanescent flower, 
Smile away thy sunless hour ; 
Every daisy, in my walk. 
Scorns thee from its humbler stalk : 
Nothing but thy form discloses 
Thy descent from royal roses : 
How thine ancestors would blush 
To behold thee on their bush, 
Drooping thy dejected head 
Where their bolder blossoms spread ; 
Withering in the frosty gale. 
Where their fragrance fill'd the vale. 

Last and meanest of thy race, 
Void of beauty, colour, grace, 
No bee dehghted sips 
Ambrosia from thy lips ; 
No spangling dew-drops gem 
Thy fine elastic stem ; 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



No living lustre glistens o'er thy bloom, 

Thy sprigs no verdant leaves adorn, 

Thy bosom breathes no exquisite perfume ; 

But pale thy countenance as snow. 

While, unconceal'd below, 

All naked glares the threatening thorn. 

Around thy bell, o'er mildew'd leaves, 
His ample web a spider weaves ; 
A wily ruffian, gaunt and grim. 
His labyrinthine toils he spreads 
Pensile and light ; — their glossy threads 
Bestrew'd with many a wing and hmb ; 
Even in thy chalice he prepares 
His deadly poison and delusive snares. 

While I pause, a vagrant fly 
Giddily comes buzzing by ; 
Round and round, on viewless wings, 
Lo ! the insect wheels and sings : 
Closely couch'd, the fiend discovers. 
Sets him with his sevenfold eyes. 
And, while o'er the verge he hovers. 
Seems to fascinate his prize. 
As the snake's magnetic glare 
Charms the flitting tribes of air, 
Till the dire enchantment draws 
Destined victims to his jaws. 
Now midst kindred corses mangled, 
On his feet alights the fly ; 
Ah ! he feels himself entangled. 
Hark ! he pours a piteous cry. 
Swift as Death's own arrows dart, 
On his prey the spider springs, 
Wounds his side, — with dexterous art 
Winds the web about his wings ; 
duick as he came, recoiling then. 
The villain vanishes into his den. 



The desperate fly perceives too late 
The hastening crisis of his fate ; 
Disaster crowds upon disaster. 
And every struggle to get free 
Snaps the hopes of liberty, 
And draws the knots of bondage faster. 

Again the spider glides along the line ; 
Hold, murderer ! hold ; — the game is mine. 
— Captive ! unwarn'd by danger, go, 
Frolic awhile in light and air ; 
Thy fate 'tis easy to foreshow. 

Preserved to perish in a safer snare ! 

Spider ! thy worthless life I spare ; 

Advice on thee 'twere vain to spend, 

Thy wicked ways thou wilt not mend,— 

Then haste thee, spoiler, mend thy net ; 

Wiser than I 

Must be yon fly, 

If he escapes thy trammels j'-et ; 

Most eagerly the trap is sought 

In which a fool has once been caught. 

And thou, poor Rose ! whose livid leaves expand, 

Cold to the sun, untempting to the hand, 

Bloom unadmired, — uninjured die ; 

Thine aspect, squalid and forlorn. 

Insures thy peaceful, dull decay ; 

Hadst thou with blushes hid thy thorn, 

Grown " sweet to sense and lovely to the eye," 

I might have pluck'd thy flower. 

Worn it an hour, 

" Then cast it like a loathsome weed away."* 



1796. 



Otway's Orphan. 



THE TIME-PIECE. 

Who is He, so swiftly flying, 
His career no eye can see ? 

Who are They, so early dying, 
From their birth they cease to be ? 

Time : — ^behold his pictured face ! 

Moments : — can you count their race ? 

Though, with aspect deep-dissembling, 
Here he feigns unconscious sleep, 

Round and round tliis circle trembhng. 
Day and night his symbols creep, 

While unseen, through earth and sky, 

His unwearying pinions fly. 

Hark ! what petty pulses, beating. 

Spring new moments into light ; 
Every pulse, its stroke repeating. 

Sends its moment back to night ; 
Yet not one of all the train 
Comes uncall'd, or flits in vain. 
In the highest realms of glory. 

Spirits trace, before the throne, 
On eternal scrolls, the story 

Of each little moment flown ; 
Every deed, and word, and thought. 
Through the whole creation wrought. 

Were the volume of a minute 
Thus to mortal sight unroU'd, 

More of sin and sorrow in it. 
More of man, might we behold, 

Than on History's broadest page, 

In the relics of an age. 

Who could bear the revelation ? 
Who abide the sudden test ? 



THE TIME-PIECE. 



— With instinctive consternation, 

Hands would cover every breast, 
Loudest tongues at once be hush'd. 
Pride in all its writhings crush'd. 

Who, with leer malign exploring, 

On his neighbour's shame durst look ? 
Would not each, intensely poring 

On that record in the book. 
Which his inmost soul reveal'd, 
Wish its leaves for ever seal'd ? 
Seal'd they are for years, and ages. 

Till, — the earth's last circuit run. 
Empire changed through all its stages, 

Risen and set the latest sun, — 
On the sea and on the land 
Shall a midnight angel stand : — 

Stand ; — and, while th' abysses tremble, 
Swear that Time shall be no more : 

Gluick and Dead shall then assemble, 
Men and Demons range before 

That tremendous judgment-seat. 

Where both worlds at issue meet. 

Time himself, with all his legions. 

Days, Months, Years, since Nature's birth, 

Shall revive, — and from all regions, 
Singhng out the sons of earth, 

With their glory or disgrace. 

Charge their spenders face to face. 

Every moment of my being 

Then shall pass before mine eyes : 

— God, all-searching ! God, all-seeing ! 
Oh ! appease them, ere they rise : 

Warn'd I fly, I fly to thee ; 

God, be merciful to me ! 



Liverpool, 1816. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



A MOTHER'S LOVE. 

A Mother's Love, — how sweet the name ! 

What is a Mother's love ? 
— A noble, pure, and tender flame, 

Enkindled from above, 
To bless a heart of earthly mould ; 
The warmest love that can grow cold ; 

This is a Mother's Love. 

To bring a helpless babe to light, 

Then, while it lies forlorn, 
To gaze upon that dearest sight, 

And feel herself new-born. 
In its existence lose her own. 
And live and breathe in it alone ; 

This is a Mother's Love. 

Its weakness in her arms to bear ; 

To cherish on her breast. 
Feed it from Love's own fountain there, 

And lull it there to rest ; 
Then, while it slumbers, watch its breath, 
As if to guard from instant death ; 

This is a Mother's Love. 

To mark its growth from day to day, 

Its opening charms admire. 
Catch from its eye the earhest ray 

Of intellectual fire ; 
To smile and listen while it talks, 
And lend a finger when it walks ; 

This is a Mother's Love. 

And can a Mother's Love grow cold ? 

Can she forget her boy ? 
His pleading innocence behold. 

Nor weep for grief — for joy ? 



A MOTHER'S LOA'E. 



A Mother may forget her child, 
While wolves devour it on the wild ; 
Is this a Mother's Love ? 

Ten thousand voices answer " No !" 

Ye clasp your babes and kiss ; 
Your bosoms yearn, your eyes o'erflow .; 

Yet, ah ! remember this, — 
The infant, rear'd alone for earth, 
May live, may die, — to curse his birth ; 

Is this a Mother's Love ? 
A parent's heart may prove a snare ; 

The child she loves so well. 
Her hand may lead, with gentlest care, 

Down the smooth road to hell ; 
Nourish its frame, — destroy its mind : 
Thus do the Wind mislead the blind, 

Even with a Mother's Love. 

Blest infant ! whom his mother taught 

Early to seek the Lord, 
And pour'd upon his dawning thought 

The day-spring of the word ; 
This was the lesson to her son, 
— Time is Eternity begun : 

Behold that Mother's Love.* 

Blest Mother ! who, in wisdom's path 

By her own parent trod. 
Thus taught her son to flee the wrath, 

And know the fear, of God : 
Ah, youth ! hke him enjoy your prime ; 
Begin Eternity in time, 

Taught by that Mother's Love. 

That Mother's Love ! — how sweet the name 1 
What was that Mother's Love ? 

— The noblest, purest, tenderest flame, 
That kindles from above, 

*2 Tim. i. 5; iii. 14, 15. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



Within a heart of earthy mould, 
As much of heaven as heart can hold, 
Nor through eternity grows cold : 
This Avas that Mother's Love. 



THE VISIBLE CREATION, 

The God of Nature and of Grace 

In all his works appears ; 
His goodness through the earth we trace, 

His grandeur in the spheres. 

Behold this fair and fertile globe, 

By Him in wisdom plann'd ; 
'Twas He who girded, like a robe. 

The ocean round the land. 

Lift to the firmament your eye. 

Thither his path pursue ; 
His glory, boundless as the sky, 

O'erwhelms the wondering view. 

He bows the heavens — the mountains stand 

A highway for their God ; 
He walks amidst the desert land, 

— 'Tis Eden where He trod. 

The forests in His strength rejoice ; 

Hark ! on the evening breeze. 
As once of old, the Lord God's voice 

Is heard among the trees. 

Here on the hills He feeds his herds, 

His flocks on yonder plains : 
His praise is warbled by the birds ; 

— Oh ! could we catch their strains ! 

— Mount with the lark, and bear our song 
Up to the gates of light. 



Or with the nightingale prolong 
Our numbers through the night ! 

In every stream his bounty flows, 

DifTusing joy and wealth ; 
In every breeze his spirit blows, 

— The breath of hfe and health. 

His blessings fall in plenteous showers 

Upon the lap of earth, 
That teems with foliage, fruit, and flowers, 

And rings with infant mirth. 

If God hath made this world so fair, 
Where sin and death abound, 

How beautiful beyond compare 
Will Paradise be found ! 



REMINISCENCES. 



Where are ye with whom in life I started. 
Dear companions of my golden days ? 

Ye are dead, estranged from me, or parted, 

— Flown, like morning clouds, a thousand ways. 

Where art thou, in youth my friend and brother, 
Yea, in soul my friend and brother still ? 

Heaven received thee, and on earth none other 
Can the void in my lorn bosom fill. 

Where is she, whose looks were love and gladness ? 

— ^Love and gladness I no longer see ! 
She is gone ; and, since that hour of sadness. 

Nature seems her sepulchre to me. 

Where am I ? — life's current faintly flowing. 
Brings the welcome warning of release ; 

Struck with death, ah ! Avhither am I going ? 
All is well, — my spirit parts in peace. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



THE REIGN OF SPRING. 

Who loves not Spring's voluptuous hours, 

The carnival of birds and flowers ? 

Yet who would choose, however dear, 

That Spring should revel all the year ? 

— Who loves not Summer's splendid reign, 

The bridal of the earth and main ? 

Yet who would choose, however bright, 

A Dog-day noon without a night ? 

— Who loves not Autumn's joyous round, 

When corn, and Avine, and oil abound ? 

Yet who would choose, however gay, 

A year of unrenew'd decay ? 

— Who loves not Winter's awful form ? 

The sphere-born music of the storm ? 

Yet who would choose, how grand soever. 

The shortest day to last for ever? 

'Twas in that age renown'd, remote, 
When all was true that Esop Avrote ; 
And in that land of fair Ideal, 
Where all that poets dream is real ; 
Upon a day of annual state. 
The Seasons met in high debate. 
There blush'd young Spring in maiden pride, 
BHthe Summer look'd a gorgeous bride, 
Staid Autumn moved with matron-grace. 
And beldame Winter pursed her face. 
Dispute grew wild ; all talk'd together ; 
The four at once made wondrous weather ; 
Nor one (whate'er the rest had shown) 
Heard any reason but her own ; 
While each (for nothing else Avas clear) 
Claim'd the whole circle of the year. 

Spring, in possession of the field, 
Compell'd her sisters soon to yield : 



THE REIGN OF SPRING. 



They part, — resolved elsewhere to try 
A twelvemonth's empire of the sky; 
And, calling off their airy legions, 
Alighted in adjacent regions. 
Spring o'er the eastern campaign smiled, 
Fell Winter ruled the northern wild, 
Summer pursued the sun's red car, 
But Autumn loved the twilight star. 

As Spring parades her new domain, 
Love, Beauty, Pleasure, hold her train ; 
Her footsteps Avake the flowers beneath. 
That start, and blush, and sweetly breathe ; 
Her gales on nimble pinions rove. 
And shake to foliage every grove ; 
Her voice, in dell and thicket heard. 
Cheers on the nest the mother-bird ; 
The ice-lock'd streams, as if they felt 
Her touch, to liquid diamond melt ; 
The lambs around her bleat and play ; 
The serpent flings his slough away, 
And shines in orient colours dight, 
A flexile ray of living light. 
Nature unbinds her wintry shroud, 
(As the soft sunshine melts the cloud,) 
With infant gambols sports along. 
Bounds into youth, and soars in song. 
The morn impearls her locks with dew. 
Noon spreads a sky of boundless blue. 
The rainbow spans the evening scene, 
The night is silent and serene. 
Save when her lonely minstrel wrings 
The heart with sweetness while he sings. 
— Who would not wish, unrivall'd here, 
That Spring might frolic all the year ? 

Three months are fled, and still she reigns, 
Exulting queen o'er hills and plains ; 
The birds renew their nuptial vow, 
Nestlings themselves are lovers now ; 




Fresh broods each bending bough receives, 

Till feathers far outnumber leaves ; 

But kites in circles swim the air, 

And sadden music to despair. 

The stagnant pools, the quaking bogs, 

Teem, croak, and crawl with hordes of frogs : 

The matted woods, th' infected earth, 

Are venomous with reptile-birth ; 

Armies of locusts cloud the skies ; 

With beetles hornets, gnats with flies. 

Interminable warfare wage. 

And madden heaven with insect-rage. 

The flowers are wither'd ; — sun nor dew 
Their fallen glories shall renew ; 
The flowers are wither'd ; — germ nor seed 
Ripen in garden, wild, or mead : 
The corn-fields shoot : — their blades, alas ! 
Run riot in luxuriant grass. 
The tainted flocks, the drooping kine, 
In famine of abundance pine. 
Where vegetation, sour, unsound. 
And loathsome, rots and rankles round ; 
Nature with nature seems at strife ; 
Nothing can hve but monstrous life 
By death engender'd ; — food and breath 
Are turn'd to elements of death ; 
And where the soil his victims strew, 
Corruption quickens them anew. 

But ere the year was half expired. 
Spring saw her folly, and retired ; 
Yoked her light chariot to a breeze, 
And mounted to the Pleiades ; 
Content with them to rest or play 
Along the calm nocturnal Avay ; 
Till, heaven's remaining circuit run, 
They meet the pale hybernal sun, 
And, gaily mingling in his blaze. 
Hail the true dawn of vernal days. 



I 



THE REIGN OF SUMMER. 



THE REIGN OF SUMMER. 

The hurricanes are fled; the rains, 

That plough'd the mountains, wreck'd the plains, 

Have pass'd away before the wind, 

And left a wilderness behind, 

As if an ocean had been there 

Exhaled, and left its channels bare. 

But, with a new and sudden birth, 

Nature, replenishes the earth; 

Plants, flowers, and shrubs, o'er all the land 

So promptly rise, so thickly stand. 

As if they heard a voice, — and came. 

Each at the calling of its name. 

The tree, by tempests stript and rent. 

Expands its verdure hke a tent. 

Beneath whose shade, in weary length, 

Th' enormous lion rests his strength. 

For blood, in dreams of hunting, burns. 

Or, chased himself, to flight returns ; 

Growls in his sleep, a dreary sound. 

Grinds his wedged teeth, and spurns the ground 

While monkeys, in grotesque amaze, 

Down from their bending perches gaze. 

But when he lifts his eye of fire, 

Cluick to the topmost boughs retire. 

Loud o'er the mountains bleat the flocks ; 
The goat is bounding on the rocks ; 
Far in the valleys range the herds ; 
The welkin gleams with flitting birds. 
Whose plumes such gorgeous tints adorn. 
They seem the offspring of the morn. 
From nectar'd flowers and groves of spice, 
Earth breathes the air of Paradise ; 



Her mines their hidden wealth betray, 
Treasures of darkness burst to day ; 
O'er golden sands the rivers glide, 
And pearls and amber track the tide. 
Of every sensual bliss possess'd, 
Man riots here ; — but is he bless'd ? 
And would he choose, for ever bright. 
This Summer-day without a night ] ' 
For here hath Summer fix'd her throne. 
Intent to reign, — and reign alone. 

Daily the sun, in his career. 
Hotter and higher, climbs the sphere, 
Till from the zenith, in his rays, 
Without a cloud or shadow, blaze 
The realms beneath him : — in his march. 
On the blue key-stone of heaven's arch. 
He stands ; — air, earth, and ocean he 
Within the presence of his eye. 
The wheel of Nature seems to rest. 
Nor rolls him onward to the west. 
Till thrice three days of noon unchanged, 
That torrid clime have so deranged. 
Nine years may not the wrong repair ; 
But Summer checks the ravage there ; 
Yet still enjoins the sun to steer 
By the stern Dog-star round the year, 
With dire extremes of day and night, 
Tartarean gloom, celestial light. 

In vain the gaudy season shines. 
Her beauty fades, her power decHnes ; 
Then first her bosom felt a care ; 
— No healing breeze embalm'd the aii, 
No mist the mountain-tops bedew'd. 
Nor shower the arid vale renew'd ; 
The herbage shrunk ; the ploughman's toil 
Scatter'd to dust the crumbling soil ; 
Blossoms were shed; th' umbrageous wood. 
Laden with sapless foliage, stood ; 



I 



THE REIGN OF SUMMER. 



The Streams, impoverish'd day by day, 

Lessen'd insensibly away ; 

Where cattle sought, with piteous moans, 

The vanish'd lymph, midst burning stones, 

And tufts of wither'd reeds, that fill 

The wonted channel of the rill ; 

Till, stung with hornets, mad with thirst. 

In sudden rout, away they burst. 

Nor rest, till where some channel deep. 

Gleams in small pools, whose waters sleep ; 

There with huge draught and eager eye 

Drink for existence, — drink and die ! 

But direr evils soon arose. 

Hopeless, unmitigable woes ; 

Man proves the shock ; through all his veins 

The frenzy of the season reigns ; 

With pride, lust, rage, ambition blind, 

He burns in every fire of mind. 

Which kindles from insane desire, 

Or fellest hatred can inspire ; 

Reckless whatever ill befall, 

He dares to do and suffer all 

That heart can think, that arm can deal. 

Or out of hell a fury feel. 

There stood in that romantic clime 
A mountain awfully sublime ; 
O'er many a league the basement spread, 
It tower'd in many an airy head. 
Height over height, — now gay, now wild. 
The peak with ice eternal piled ; 
Pure in mid-heaven, that crystal cone 
A diadem of glory shone. 
Reflecting, in the night-fall'n sky, 
The beams of day's departed eye ; 
Or holding, ere the dawn begun, 
Communion with th' unrisen sun. 
The cultured sides Ave re clothed with woods, 
Vineyards, and fields ; or track'd with floods, 



MISCELLANKOUS POEMS. 



Whose glacier fountains, hid on high, 
Sent down their rivers from the sky. 
O'er plains, that mark'd its gradual scale, 
On sunny slope, in shelter'd vale. 
Earth's universal tenant, — He, 
Who hves wherever life may be. 
Sole, social, fix'd, or free to roam, 
Always and everywhere at home, 
Man pitch'd his tents, adorn'd his bowers. 
Built temples, palaces, and towers. 
And made that Alpine world his own, 
— The miniature of every zone. 
From brown savannas parch'd below, 
To ridges of cerulean snow. 

Those high-lands form'd a last retreat 
From rabid Summer's fatal heat : 
Though not unfelt her fervours there. 
Vernal and cool the middle air ; 
While from the icy pyramid 
Streams of unfailing freshness slid. 
That long had slaked the thirsty land. 
Till avarice, with insatiate hand. 
Their currents check'd ; in sunless caves. 
And rock-bound dells, engulf 'd the waves, 
And thence in scanty measures doled, 
Or turn'd heaven's bounty into gold. 
Ere long the dwellers on the plain 
Murmur'd ; — their murmurs Avere in vain ; 
Petition'd, — but their prayers were spurn'd 
Threaten'd, — defiance was return'd ; 
Then rang both regions with alarms ; 
Blood-kindling trumpets blew to arms ; 
The maddening drum and deafening fife 
Marshall'd the elements of strife : 
Sternly the mountaineers maintain 
Their rights against th' insurgent plain ; 
The plain's indignant myriads rose 
To wrest the mountain from their foes, 



THE REIGN OF SUMMER. 



Resolved its blessings to enjoy- 
By dint of valour, — or destroy. 

The legions met in war-array ; 
The mountaineers brook'd no delay ; 
Aside their missile weapons threw, 
From holds impregnable withdrew, 
And, rashly brave, with sword and shield, 
Rush'd headlong to the open field. 
Their foes th' auspicious omen took, 
And raised a battle-shout that shook 
The campaign ; — stanch and keen for blood. 
Front threatening front, the columns stood ; 
But, while like thunder-clouds they frown, 
In tropic haste the sun went down ; 
Night o'er both armies stretch'd her tent, 
The star-bespangled firmament. 
Whose placid host, revolving slow, 
Smile on th' impatient hordes below, 
That chafe and fret the hours away. 
Curse the dull gloom, and long for day. 
Though destined by their own decree 
No other day nor night to see. 
— That night is past, that day begun ; 
Swift as he sunk ascends the sun. 
And from the red horizon springs 
Upward, as borne on eagle-wings : 
Aslant each army's lengthen'd lines. 
O'er shields and helms he proudly shines 
While spears, that catch his lightnings keen, 
Flash them athwart the space between. 
Before the battle-shock, when breath 
And pulse are still, — awaiting death ; 
In that cold pause, which seems to be 
The prelude to eternity, 
When fear, ere yet a blow is dealt, 
Betray'd by none, by all is felt ; 
While, moved beneath their feet, the tomb 
Widens her lap to make them room ; 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



— Till, in the onset of the fray, 

Fear, feeling, thought are cast away. 

And foaming, raging, mingling foes. 

Like billows dash'd in conflict, close. 

Charge, strike, repel, wound, struggle, fly. 

Gloriously win, unconqucr'd die : — 

Here, in dread silence, while they stand, 

Each with a death-stroke in his hand, 

His eye fix'd forward, and his ear 

Tingling the signal blast to hear ; 

The trumpet sounds ; — one note, — no more ; 

The field, the fight, the war is o'er ; 

An earthquake rent the void between ; 

A moment show'd, and shut the scene ; 

Men, chariots, steeds, — of either host, 

The flower, the pride, the strength were lost : 

A solitude remains ; — the dead 

Are buried there, — the living fled. 

Nor yet the reign of Summer closed ; 
— At night in their own homes reposed 
The fugitives, on either side. 
Who 'scaped the death their comrades died ; 
When, lo ! with many a giddy shock 
The mountain-clifls began to rock. 
And deep below the hollow ground 
Ran a strange mystery of sound. 
As if, in chains and torments there, 
Spirits were venting their despair. 
That sound, those shocks, the sleepers woke ; 
In trembling consternation, broke 
Forth from their dwellings, young and old ; 
— Nothing abroad their eyes behold 
But darkness so intensely wrought, 
'Twas blindness in themselves they thought. 
Anon, aloof, with sudden rays, 
Issued so fierce, so broad a blaze, 
That darkness started into light. 
And every eye, restored to sight, 



THE REIGN OF SUMMER. 



Gazed on the glittering crest of snows, 
Whence the bright conflagration rose, 
Whose flames condensed at once aspire, 
— A pillar of celestial fire. 
Alone amidst infernal shade. 
In glorious majesty display'd : 
Beneath, from rifted caverns, broke 
Volumes of sufibcating smoke. 
That roll'd in surges, like a flood, 
By the red radiance turn'd to blood ; 
Morn look'd aghast upon the scene. 
Nor could a sunbeam pierce between 
The panoply of vapours, spread 
Above, around the mountain's head. 

In distant fields, with drought consumed, 
Joy swell'd all hearts, all eyes illumed. 
When from that peak, through lowering skies, 
Thick curling clouds were seen to rise. 
And hang o'er all the darken'd plain, 
The presage of descending rain. 
Th' exulting cattle bound along, 
The tuneless birds attempt a song, 
The swain, amidst his sterile lands. 
With outstretch'd arms of rapture stands. 
But, fraught with plague and curses, came 
Th' insidious progeny of flame ; 
Ah ! then, — for fertilizing showers. 
The pledge of herbage, fruits, and flowers, — 
Words cannot paint, how every eye 
(Blood-shot and dim with agony) 
Was glazed, as by a palsying spell, 
When light sulphureous ashes fell, 
Dazzling, and eddying to and fro. 
Like wildering sleet or feathery snow : 
Strewn with gray pumice Nature lies. 
At every motion quick to rise. 
Tainting with Hvid fumes the air; 
— Then hope lies down in prone despair, 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



And man and beast, with misery dumb, 
Sullenly brood on woes to come. 

The mountain now, like living earth, 
Pregnant with some stupendous birth. 
Heaved, in the anguish of its throes. 
Sheer from its crest th' incumbent snows; 
And where of old they chill'd the sky, 
Beneath the sun's meridian eye. 
Or, purpling in the golden west, 
Appear'd his evening throne of rest. 
There, black and bottomless and wide, 
A cauldron, rent from side to side, 
Simmer'd and hiss'd with huge turmoil; 
Earth's disemboweU'd minerals boil, 
And thence in molten torrents rush ; 
— Water and fire, like sisters, gush 
From the same source ; the double stream 
Meets, battles, and explodes in steam ; 
Then fire prevails ; and broad and deep 
Red lava roars from steep to steep ; 
While rocks unseated, woods upriven, 
Are headlong down the current driven ; 
Columnar flames are wrapt aloof. 
In whirlwind forms, to heaven's high roof. 
And there, amidst transcendent gloom. 
Image the wrath beyond the tomb. 

The mountaineers, in wild affright. 
Too late for safety, urge their flight ; 
Women, made childless in the fray, 
Women, made mothers yesterday. 
The sick, the aged, and the blind ; 
— None but the dead are left behind. 
Painful their journey, toilsome, slow. 
Beneath their feet quick embers glow, 
And hurtle round in dreadful hail ; 
Their limbs, their hearts, their senses fail 
While many a victim, by the way, 
Buried aUve in ashes lay. 



THE REIGN OF SUMMER. 



Or perish'd by the lightning's stroke, 

Before the slower thunder broke. 

A few the open field explore : 

The throng seek refuge on the shore, 

Between two burning rivers hemm'd. 

Whose rage nor mounds nor hollows stemm'd ; 

Driven like a herd of deer, they reach 

The lonely, dark, and silent beach. 

Where, calm as innocence in sleep, 

Expanded hes th' unconscious deep. 

Awhile the fugitives respire, 

And watch those cataracts of fire 

(That bar escape on either hand) 

Rush on the ocean from the strand ; 

Back from the onset rolls the tide. 

But instant clouds the conflict hide ; 

The lavas plunge to gulfs unknown. 

And, as they plunge, collapse to stone. 

Meanwhile the mad volcano grew 
Tenfold more terrible to view ; 
And thunders, such as shall be hurl'd 
At the death-sentence of the world ; 
And lightnings, such as shall consume 
Creation, and creation's tomb. 
Nor leave, amidst th' eternal void, 
One trembhng atom undestroy'd ; 
Such thunders crash'd, such lightnings glared : 
— Another fate those outcasts shared, 
When, with one desolating sweep, 
An earthquake seem'd t' ingulf the deep. 
Then threw it back, and from its bed 
Hung a whole ocean overhead ; 
The victims shriek'd beneath the wave, 
And in a moment found one grave ; 
Down to th' abyss the flood return'd, — 
Alone, unseen, the mountain burn'd. 



INSTRUCTION. 

From heaven descends the drops of dew, 

From heaven the gracious showers, 
Earth's winter-aspect to renew, 

And clothe the spring with flowers ; 
From heaven the beams of morning flow, 

That melt the gloom of night ; 
From heaven the evening breezes blow, 

Health, fragrance, and delight. 

Like genial dew, like fertile showers. 

The words of wisdom fall. 
Awaken man's unconscious powers, 

Strength out of weakness call : 
Like morning beams they strike the mind, 

Its lovehness reveal ; 
And softer than the evening wind, 

The wounded spirit heal. 

As dew and rain, as light and air, 

From heaven instruction came, 
The waste of Nature to repair, 

Kindle a sacred flame ; 
A flame to purify the earth. 

Exalt her sons on high, 
And train them for their second birth, 

— Their birth beyond the sky. 

Albion ! on every human soul, 

By thee be knowledge shed. 
Far as the ocean-waters roll, 

Wide as the shores are spread : 



A NIGHT IN A STAGE-COACII. 



Truth makes thy children free at home ; 

Oh ! that thy flag, unfurl'd, 
Might shine, where'er thy children roam, 

Truth's Banner round the world. 



London, 1812. 



A NIGHT IN A STAGE-COACH : 



BEING A MEDITATION ON THE WAY BETWEEN LONDON 
AND BRISTOL, 

SEPTEMBER 23, 1815. 

I TRAVEL all the irksome night, 

By ways to me unknown ; 
I travel, like a bird in flight. 

Onward, and all alone. 

In vain I close my weary eyes, 

They will not, cannot sleep. 
But, like the watchers of the skies. 

Their twinkling vigils keep. 

My thoughts are wandering wild and far ; 

From earth to heaven they dart ; 
Now Aving their flight from star to star, 

Now dive into my heart. 

Backward they roll the tide of time, 

And live through vanish'd years. 
Or hold their " colloquy subUme" 

With future hopes and fears ; 

Then passing joys and present woes 
Chase through my troubled mind, 

Repose still seeking, — but repose 
Not for a moment find. 



So yonder lone and lovely moon 
Gleams on the clouds gone by, 

Illumines those around her noon, 
Yet westward points her eye. 

Nor wind nor flood her course delay, 
Through heaven I see her glide ; 

She never pauses on her way, 
She never turns aside. 

With anxious heart and throbbing brain, 
Strength, patience, spirits gone, 

Pulses of fire in every vein, 
Thus, thus I journey on. 

But soft ! — in Nature's failing hour, 

Up springs a breeze, — I feel 
Its balmy breath, its cordial power, 

A power to soothe and heal. 

Lo ! gray, and gold, and crimson streaks 

The gorgeous east adorn, 
While o'er th' empurpled mountain breaks 

The glory of the morn. 

Insensibly the stars retire, 

Exhaled like drops of dew ; 
Now through an arch of living fire, 

The sun comes forth to view. 

The hills, the vales, the waters burn 

With his enkindhng rays. 
No sooner touch'd than they return 

A tributary blaze. 

His quickening light on me descends, 

His cheering warmth I own ; 
Upward lo him my spirit tends. 

But worships God alone. 

Oh ! that on me, with beams benign, 
His countenance would turn : 



I 



A NIGHT IN A STAGE-COACH. 



I too should then arise and shine, 
— Arise, and shine, and burn. 

Slowly I raise my languid head, 

Pain and soul-sickness cease ; 
The phantoms of dismay are fled, 

And health returns, and peace. 

Where is the beauty of the scene, 

Which silent night display'd ? 
The clouds, the stars, the blue serene, 

The moving hght and shade ? 

All gone ! — the moon, erewhile so bright, 

VeiPiwith a dusky shroud, 
Seems, in the sun's o'erpowering light. 

The fragment of a cloud. 

At length, I reach my journey's end : 

Welcome that well-known face ! 
I meet a, brother and a friend ; 

I find a resting-place. 

Just such a pilgrimage is life ; 

Hurried from stage to stage, 
Our wishes with our lot at strife, 

Through childhood to old age. 

The world is seldom what it seems : — 

To man, who dimly sees. 
Realities appear as dreams. 

And dreams realities. 

The Christian's years, though slow their flight, 

When he is call'd away, 
Are but the watches of a night, 

And Death the dawn of day. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



INCOGNITA : 

ON VIEWING THE PICTURE OF AN UNKNOWN LADY. 

WRITTEN AT LEAMINGTON, IN 1817. 
" She was a phantom of deliglit." Wordswohth. 

Image of One, who lived of yore ! 

Hail to that lovely mien, 
Once quick and conscious, — now no more 

On land or ocean seen ! 
Were all earth's bieathing forms to pass 
Before me in Agrippa's glass, ^ 
Many as fair as Thou might be, 
But oh ! not one, — not one like Thee. 

Thou art no Child of Fancy ; — Thou 

The very look dost Avear, 
That gave enchantment to a broAV, 

Wreathed with luxuriant hair ; 
Lips of the morn embathed in dew, 
And eyes of evening's starry blue ; 
Of all who e'er enjoyed the sun, 
Thou art the image of but One. 

And who was she, in virgin prime. 

And May of womanhood, 
Whose roses here, unpluck'd by Time, 

In shadowy tints have stood ; 
While many a winter's withering blast 
Hath o'er the dark cold chamber pass'd. 
In which her once-resplendent form 
Slumber'd to dust beneath the storm ? 

Of gentle blood ; — upon her birth 

Consenting planets smiled, 
And she had seen those days of mirth 

That frolic round the child ; 



INCOGNITA. 



To bridal bloom her strength had sprung, 
Behold her beautiful and young ! 
Lives there a record, which hath told 
That she was wedded, widow'd, old ? 

How long her date, 'twere vain to guess : 

The pencil's cunning art 
Can but a single glance express. 

One motion of the heart ; 
A smile, a blush, — a transient grace 
Of air, and attitude, and face ; 
One passion's changing colour mix. 
One moment's flight for ages fix. 

Her joys and griefs alike in vain 

•Would faacy here recall ; 
Her throbs of ecstasy or pain 

LuU'd in obHvion all ; 
With her, methinks, life's little hour 
Pass'd like the fragrance of a flower, 
That leaves upon the vernal wind 
Sweetness we ne'er again may find. 

Where dwelt she ? — Ask yon aged tree, 
Whose boughs embower the lawn. 

Whether the birds' wild minstrelsy 
Awoke her here at dawn ? 

Whether beneath its youthful shade. 

At noon, in infancy she played ? 

— If from the oak no answer come. 

Of her all oracles are dumb. 

The Dead are Hke the stars by day ; 

— Withdrawn from mortal eye. 
But not extinct, they hold their way 

In glory through the sky : 
Spirits, from bondage thus set free. 
Vanish amidst immensity, 
Where human thought, Hke human sight. 
Fails to pursue their trackless flight. 



> MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 

Somewhere within created space, 

Could I explore that round, 
In bliss, or wo, there is a place 

Where she might still be found; 
And oh ! unless those eyes deceive, 
I may, I must, I will believe, 
That she, whose charms so meekly glow, 
Is what she only seem'd below ; — 

An angel in that glorious realm 

Where God himself is King : 
— But awe and fear, that overwhelm 

Presumption, check my wing ; 
Nor dare imagination look 
Upon the symbols of that book, 
Wherein eternity enrols 
The judgments on departed souls. 

Of Her of whom these pictured lines 

A faint resemblance form ; 
— Fair as the second rainbow shines 

Aloof amid the storm ; 
Of Her, this " shadow of a shade," 
Like its original, must fade, 
And She, forgotten when unseen, 
Shall be as if she ne'er had been. 

Ah ! then, perchance, this dreaming strain. 

Of all that e'er I sung, 
A lorn memorial may remain, 

When silent lies my tongue ; 
When shot the meteor of my fame, 
Lost the vain echo of my name. 
This leaf, this fallen leaf, may be 
The only trace of her and me. 

With One Avho lived of old, my song 

In lowly cadence rose ; 
To One who is unborn, belong 

The accents of its close : 



WINTER-LIGHTNING. 



Ages to come, with courteous ear, 
Some youth my warning voice may hear ; 
And voices from the dead should be 
The warnings of eternity. 

When these weak lines thy presence greet, 

Reader ! if I am bless'd, 
Again, as spirits, may we meet 

In glory and in rest ! 
If not, — and / have lost my way. 
Here part we, — go not Thou astray : 
No tomb, no verse my story tell ; 
Once, and for ever, Fare Thee weU ! 



WINTER-LIGHTNING. 

The flash at midnight ! — 'twas a hght 
That gave the bhnd a moment's sight. 

Then sunk in tenfold gloom ; 
Loud, deep, and long the thunder broke. 
The deaf ear instantly awoke. 

Then closed as in the tomb : 
An angel might have pass'd my bed, ' 
Sounded the trump of God, and fled. 

So life appears ; — a sudden birth, 
A glance revealing heaven and earth. 

It is and it is not ! 
So fame the poet's hope deceives, 
Who sings for after-times, and leaves 

A name to be forgot : 
Life is a lightning-flash of breath, 
Fame but a thunder-clap at death. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



THE LITTLE CLOUD. 

Seen in a country excursion among tlie woods and roclis of Wliarncliffe and the 
adjacent park and pleasure grounds of Wortley Hall, the seat of the Right 
Honourable Lord Wharncliffe, near Sheffield, on the 30th day of June, 1818. 

The summer sun was in the west, 
Yet far above his evening rest ; 
A thousand clouds in air display'd 
Their floating isles of light and shade, 
The sky, like ocean's channels, seen 
In long meandering streaks between. 

Cultured and waste, the landscape lay, 
Woods, mountains, valleys stretch'd away, 
And throng'd th' immense horizon round. 
With heaven's eternal girdle bound ; 
From inland towns, eclipsed with smoke. 
Steeples in lonely grandeur broke ; 
Hamlets, and cottages, and streams. 
By glimpses caught the casual gleams, 
Or blazed in lustre broad and strong, 
Beyond the picturing powers of song : 
O'er all the eye enchanted ranged. 
While colours, forms, proportions changed, 
Or sunk in distance undefined. 
Still as our devious course inclined, 
— And oft we paused, and look'd behind. 

One little cloud, and only one, 
Seem'd the pure offspring of the sun. 
Flung from his orb to show us here 
What clouds adorn his hemisphere ; 
Unmoved, unchanging, in the gale, 
That bore the rest o'er hill and dale. 
Whose shadowy shapes, with lights around, 
Like living motions, swept the ground, 



This little cloud, and this alone, 

Long in the highest ether shone ; 

Gay as a warrior's banner spread, 

Its sunward margin ruby-red, 

Green, purple, gold, and every hue 

That glitters in the morning dew, 

Or glows along the rainbow's form, 

— The apparition of the storm. 

Deep in its bosom, diamond-bright. 

Behind a fleece of pearly white. 

It seem'd a secret glory dwelt, 

Whose presence, while unseen, was felt ; 

Like Beauty's eye, in slumber hid 

Beneath a half-transparent lid. 

From Avhence a sound, a touch, a breath. 

Might startle it, — as life from death. 

Looks, words, emotions of surprise, 
Welcomed the stranger to our eyes : 
Was it the phoenix, that from earth 
In flames of incense sprang to birth ? 
Had ocean from his lap let fly 
His loveliest halcyon through the sky ? 
No : — while we gazed, the pageant grew 
A nobler object to our view ; 
We deem'd, if heaven with earth would hold 
Communion, as in days of old. 
Such, on his journey down the sphere, 
Benignant Raphael might appear, 
In splendid mystery conceal'd, 
Yet by his rich disguise reveal'd : 
— That buoyant vapour, in mid-air, 
An angel in its folds might bear, 
Who, through the curtain of his shrine, 
Betray'd his lineaments divine. 
The wild, the warm illusion stole, 
Like inspiration, o'er the soul. 
Till thought was rapture, language hung 
Silent but trembling- on the tong-ue : 



And fancy almost hoped to hail 
The seraph rushing through his veil, 
Or hear an awful voice proclaim 
The embassy on which he came. 

But ah ! no minister of grace 
Show'd from the firmament his face, 
Nor, borne aloof on balanced wings, 
Reveal'd unutterable things. 
The sun went down : — the vision pass'd ; 
The cloud was hut a cloud at last ; 
Yet, when its brilliancy decay'd, 
The eye still lingered on the shade. 
And watching, till no longer seen, 
Loved it for what it once had been. 

That cloud was beautiful, — was one 
Among a thousand round the sun ; 
The thousand shared the common lot ; 
They came, — they went, — they were forgot ; 
This fairy-form alone impress'd 
Its perfect image in my breast, 
And shines as richly blazon'd there 
As in its element of air. 

The day on which that cloud appear'd. 
Exhilarating scenes endear'd : 
— The sunshine on the hills, the floods ; 
The breeze, the twihght of the woods ; 
Nature in every change of green. 
Heaven in unnumber'd aspects seen ; 
Health, spirits, exercise, release 
From noise and smoke ; twelve hours of peace ; 
No fears to haunt, no cares to vex ; 
Friends, young and old, of either sex ; 
Converse familiar, sportive, kind, 
Where heart meets heart, mind quickens mind, 
And words and thoughts are all at play. 
Like children on a holiday ; 
— Till themes celestial rapt the soul 
In adoration o'er the pole. 



THE LITTLE CLOUD. 



Where stars are darkness in His sight, 

Who reigns invisible in Hght, 

High above all created things, 

The Lord of lords, the King of kings ! 

Faith, which could thus on wing sublime 

Oulsoar the bounded flight of time ; 

Hope full of immortahty. 

And God in all the eye could see ; 

— These, these endear'd that day to me, 

And made it, in a thousand vv'ays, 

A day among a thousand days, 

That share with clouds the common lot ; 

They come, — they go, — they are forgot : 

This, like that plaything of the sun, 

— The httle, lonely, lovely one. 

This lives within me ; this shall be 

A part of my eternity. 

Amidst the cares, the toils, the strife, 
The weariness and waste of life, 
That day shall memory oft restore, 
And in a moment hve it o'er. 
When, with a lightning-flash of thought, 
Morn, noon, and eve at once are brought 
(As through the vision of a trance) 
All in the compass of a glance. 

Oh ! should I reach a world above, 
And sometimes think of those I love. 
Of things on earth too dearly prized, 
(Nor yet by saints in heaven despised,) 
Though Spirits made perfect may lament 
Life's hoher hours as half mis-spent, 
Methinks I could not turn away 
The fond remembrance of that day, 
The bright idea of that cloud, 
(Survivor of a countless crowd,) 
Without a pause, perhaps a sigh, 
To think such loveliness should die, 
And clouds and days of storm and gloom 




Scowl on Man's passage to the tomb. 
—Not so : — I feel I have a heart 
Blessings to share, improve, impart, 
In blithe, severe, or pensive mood, 
At home, abroad, in solitude, 
Whatever clouds are on the wing. 
Whatever day the seasons bring. 
That is true happiness below. 
Which conscience cannot turn to wo ; 
And though such happiness depends 
Neither on clouds, nor days, nor friends, 
TVIien friends, and days, and clouds unite. 
And kindred chords are tuned aright. 
The harmonies of heaven and earth, 
Through eye, ear, intellect, give birth 
To joys too exquisite to last, 
— And yet more exquisite when past ! 
When the soul summons by a spell 
The ghosts of pleasures round her cell, 
In saintlier forms than erst they wore, 
And smiles benigner than before. 
Each loved, lamented scene renews, 
With Avarmer touches, tenderer hues ; 
Recalls kind words for ever flown. 
But echoed in a soften'd tone ; 
Wakes, with new pulses in the breast. 
Feelings forgotten or at rest ; 
— The thought how fugitive and fair. 
How dear and precious such things were ! 
That thought, with gladness more refined. 
Deep and transporting, thrills the mind, 
Than all those pleasures of an hour. 
When most the soul confess'd their power. 

Bliss in possession will not last ; 
Remember'd joys are never past ; 
At once the fountain, stream, and sea. 
They were, — they are, — they yet shall be. 




ABDALLAH AND SABAT.* 

From West Arabia to Bochara came 

A noble youth, Abdallah was his name ; 

Who journey'd through the various East to find 

New forms of man, in feature, habit, mind ; 

Where Tartar-hordes through nature's pastures run, 

A race of Centaurs, — horse and rider one ; 

Where the soft Persian maid the breath inhales 

Of love-sick roses, woo'd by nightingales ; 

Where India's grim array of idols seem 

The rabble-phantoms of a maniac's dream : 

— Himself the flowery path of trespass trod, 

Which the false Prophet deck'd to lure from God. 

But He, who changed, into the faith of Paul, 

The slaughter-breathing enmity of Saul, 

Vouchsafed to meet Abdallah by the way : 

No miracle of hght eclipsed the day ; 

No vision from the eternal world, nor sound 

Of awe and wonder smote him to the ground ; 

All mild and calm, with power till then unknown, 

The gospel-glory through his darkness shone ; 

A still small whisper, only heard within. 

Convinced the trembling penitent of sin; 

And Jesus, whom the Infidel abhorr'd. 

The Convert now invoked, and call'd him Lord. 

Escaping from the lewd Impostor's snare, 

As flits a bird released through boundless air, 

And, soaring up the pure blue ether, sings, 

— So rose his Spirit on exulting wings. 

But love, joy, peace, the Christian's bliss below, 

Are deeply mingled in a cup of wo. 



* See Buchanan's " Christian Researches in India," for the martyrdom of 
Abdallah, and the conversion and labours of Sabat. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



Which none can pass : — he, counting all things loss 
For his Redeemer, gladly bore the cross : 
Soon call'd, with life, to lay that burden down, 
In the first iight he Avon the Martyr's crown. 
Abdallah's friend was Sabat ; — one of those 
Whom love estranged transforms to bitterest foes : 
From persecution to that friend he fled ; 
But Sabat pour'd reproaches on his head, 
Spurn'd hke a leprous plague the prostrate youth, 
And hated him as falsehood hates the truth ; 
Yet first with sophistry and menace tried 
To turn him from " the faithful word" aside ; 
All failing, old esteem to rancour turn'd. 
With Mahomet's own reckless rage he burn'd. 
A thousand hideous thoughts Hke fiends, possess'd 
The Pandemonium of the Bigot's breast. 
Whose fires, enkindled from the infernal lake, 
Abdallah's veins, unsluiced, alone could slake. 

The victim, dragg'd to slaughter by his friend, 
Witness'd a good confession to the end. 
Bochara pour'd her people forth, to gaze 
Upon the direst scene the world displays. 
The blood of innocence by treason spilt, 
The reeldng triumph of deep-branded guilt : 
— Bochara pour'd her people forth, to eye 
The loveliest spectacle beneath the sky, 
The look with which a Martyr yields his breath, 
—The resurrection of the soul in death. 
' Renounce the Nazarene !" the headsman cries, 
And flash'd the unstain'd falchion in his eyes : 
" No ! — be his name by heaven and earth adored !" 
He said, and gave his right hand to the sword. 
" Renounce Him, who forsakes thee thus bereft ;" 
He wept, but spake not, and resign'd his left. 
" Renounce Him now, who will not, cannot save :" 
He kneel'd, like Stephen, look'd beyond the grave, 
And, while the dawn of heaven around him broke, 
Bow'd his meek head to the disseverinsf stroke: 



ABDALLAH AND SABAT. 



Out-cast on earth a mangled body lay ; 
A spirit enter'd Paradise that day. 

But where is Sabat ? — Conscience-struck he stands, 
With eye of agony, and fast-lock'd hands. 
Abdallah, in the moment to depart. 
Had turn'd, and look'd the traitor through the heart : 
It smote him like a judgment from above, 
Tliat gentle look of wrong'd, forgiving love ! 
Then hatred vanished ; suddenly repress'd 
Were the strange flames of passion in his breast ; 
Nought but the smouldering ashes of despair, 
Blackness of darkness, death of death, were there. 
Ere long, wild whirlwinds of remorse arise ; 
He flies, — from all except himself he flies, 
And a low voice for ever thrilling near. 
The voice of blood which none but he can hear. 

He fled from guilt ; but guilt and he were one, 
A Spirit seeking rest and finding none ;. 
Visions of horror haunted him by night. 
Yet darkness was less terrible than light ; 
From dreams of wo when startled nature broke. 
To woes that were not dreams the wretch awoke. 
Forlorn he ranged through India, till the Power, 
That met Abdallah in a happier hour, 
Arrested Sabat : through his soul he felt 
The word of truth ; his heart began to melt, 
And yielded slowly, as cold Winter yields 
When the warm Spring comes flushing o'er the fields : 
Then first a tear of gladness swell'd his eye. 
Then first his bosom heaved a healthful sigh ; 
That bosom, parch'd as Afric's desert land ; 
That eye, a flint-stone in the burning sand. 
— Peace, pardon, hope, eternal joy, reveal'd, 
Humbled his heart : before the cross he kneel'd, 
Look'd up to Him whom once he pierced, and bore 
The name of Christ which he blasphemed before. 
— Was Sabat then subdued by love or fear ? 
And who shall vouch that he was not sincere ? 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



Now with a Convert's zeal his ardent mind 
Glow'd for the common weal of all mankind ; 
Yet with inlenser faith the Arabian pray'd, 
When homeward thoug-ht thro' childhood's Eden stray'd. 
— There, in the lap of Yemen's happiest vale, 
The shepherds' tents are waving to the gale ; 
The Patriarch of their tribe, his sire, he sees 
Beneath the shadow of ambrosial trees ; 
His Sisters, from the fountain in the rock. 
Pour the cool sparkling water to their flock ; 
His Brethren, rapt on steeds and camels, roam 
O'er wild and mountain, all the land their home : 
— Thither he long'd to send that book, unseal'd. 
Whose words are life, whose leaves his wounds had heal'd ; 
That Ishmael, living by his sword and bow, 
Might thus again the God of Abraham know ; 
And Meccan pilgrims to Caaba's shrine, 
Like locusts marching in perpetual line. 
Might quit the broad, to choose the narrow path, 
That leads to glory, and reclaims from wrath. 
Fired with the hope to bless his native soil. 
Years roll'd unfelt, in consecrated toil. 
To mould the truths which holy writers teach 
In the loved accents of his mother's speech ; 
While, like the sun, that always to the west 
Leads the bright day, his fervent spirit press'd, 
Thither a purer light from heaven to dart, 
— The only hght that reaches to the heart ; 
Whose deserts blossom where its beams are shed, 
The blind behold them, and they raise the dead. 
Nor by Arabia were his labours bound. 
To Persian lips he taught " the joyful sound." 
Would he had held unchanged that high career ! 
— But Sabat fell like Hghtning from his sphere : 
Once with the morning stars God's works he sung ; 
Anon a Serpent, with envenom'd tongue. 
Like that apostate fiend who tempted Eve, 
Gifted with speech, — he spake but to deceive. 



ABDALLAH AND SABAT. 



Let pity o'er his errors cast a veil ! 
Haste to the sequel of his tragic tale. 
Sabat became a vagabond on earth ; 
— He chose the Sinner's way, the Scorner's mirth ; 
Now feign'd contrition with obdurate tears, 
Then wore a bravery that betray'd his fears ; 
With oaths and curses now his Lord denied, 
And strangled guilty shame with desperate pride ; 
While inly-rack'd, he proved what culprits feel. 
When conscience breaks remembrance on the wheel. 
At length an outlaw through the orient isles, 
Snared in the subtilty of his own wiles. 
He perish'd in an unexpected hour. 
To glut the vengeance of barbarian power ; 
With sackcloth shrouded, to a millstone bound, 
And in th' abysses of the ocean drown'd. 
— Oh ! what a plunge into the dark was there ! 
How ended hfe ? — In blasphemy, or prayer? 
The winds are fled that heard his parting cry, 
The waves that stifled it make no reply. 

When, at the resurrection of the Just, 
Earth shall yield back Abdallah from the dust, 
The sea, like rising clouds, give up its dead, 
Then from the deep shall Sabat Hft his head. 
With waking millions round the judgment-seat, 
Once, and but once again, those twain shall meet, 
To part for ever, — or to part no more : 
— But who th' eternal secret shall explore, 
When Justice seals the gates of heaven and hell ? 
The rest — that day, that day alone, will tell. 




QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS. 

Flowers, wherefore do ye bloom ? 

— We strew thy pathway to the tomb. 

Stars, wherefore do ye rise ? 

— To hght thy spirit to the skies. 

Fair Moon, why dost tiiou wane ? 

— That I may wax again. 

O Sun, what makes thy beams so bright ? 

— The Word that said, — "Let there be Hght." 

Planets, what guides you in your course ? 

— Unseen, unfelt, unfailing force. 

Nature, whence sprang thy glorious frame ? 

— My Maker call'd me, and I came. 

O Light, thy subtle essence who may know ? 

— Ask not ; for all things but myself I show. 

What is yon arch which everywhere I see ? 

— The sign of omnipresent Deity. 

Where rests the horizon's all-embracing zone ? 

— Where earth, God's footstool, touches heaven, his throne. 

Ye clouds, what bring ye in your train ? 

— God's embassies, — storm, Hghtning, hail, or rain. 

Winds, whence and whither do ye blow ? 

— Thou must be born again to know. 

Bow in the cloud, what token dost thou bear ? 

— That Justice still cries " strike" and Mercy " spare." 

Dews of the morning, wherefore were ye given ? 

— To shine on earth, then rise to heaven. 

Rise, ghtter, break ; yet. Bubble, tell me why ? 

— To show the course of all beneath the sky. 

Stay, Meteor, stay thy faUing fire .' 

— No, thus shall all the host of heaven expire. 

Ocean, what law thy chainless waves confined ? 

— That which in Reason's limits holds thy mind. 



Time, whither dost thou flee ? 

— I travel to Eternity. 

Eternity, what art thou, — say ? 

— Time past, time present, time to come, — to-day. 

Ye Dead, where can your dwelling be ? 

— The house for all the living :— come and see. 

O Life, what is thy breath ? 

— A vapour lost in death. 

O Death, how ends thy strife ? 

— In everlasting life. 

O Grave, where is thy victory ? 

— Ask Him who rose again for me. 



THE ALPS: 

A REVERIE. 

Part I. Day. 



The mountains of this glorious land 

Are conscious beings to mine eye. 
When at the break of day they stand 

Like giants, looking through the sky, 
To hail the sun's unrisen car. 

That gilds their diadems of snow ; 
While one by one, as star by star. 

Their peaks in ether glow. 

Their silent presence fills my soul, 

When, to the horizontal ray, 
The many-tinctured vapours roll 

In evanescent wreaths away. 
And leave them naked on the scene. 

The emblems of eternity, 
The same as they have ever been, 

And shall for ever be. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



Yet through the valley while I range, 

Their cliffs, like images in dreams, 
Colour, and shape, and station change ; 

Here crags and caverns, woods and streams, 
And seas of adamantine ice, 

With gardens, vineyards-, fields embraced. 
Open a way to Paradise, 

Through all the splendid waste. 

The goats are hanging on the rocks. 

Wide through their pastures roam the herds ; 
Peace on the uplands feeds her flocks, 

Till suddenly the king of birds 
Pouncing a lamb, they start for fear ; 

He bears his bleating prize on high ; 
The well-known plaint his nestlings hear. 

And raise a ravening cry. 

The sun in morning freshness shines ; 

At noon behold his orb o'ercast ; 
Hollow and dreary o'er the pines, 

Like distant ocean, moans the blast ; 
The mountains darken at the sound. 

Put on their armour, and anon. 
In panoply of clouds wrapt round. 

Their forms from sight are gone. 

Hark ! war in heaven ! — the battle-shout 

Of thunder rends the echoing air ; 
Lo ! war in heaven ! — thick-flashing out 

Through torrent-rains red lightnings glare. 
As though the Alps, with mortal ire. 

At once a thousand voices raised. 
And with a thousand swords of fire, 

At once in conflict blazed. 



Part II. Night. 

n Evening, in the w 

Enthrone the storm-dispelling sun, 
And let the triple rainbow rest 

O'er all the mountain-tops : — 'tis done ; 
The deluge ceases ; bold and bright 

The rainbow shoots from hill to hill ; 
Down sinks the sun ; on presses night ; 

— Mont Blanc is lovely still. 

There take thy stand, my spirit ; — spread 

The world of shadows at thy feet ; 
And mark how calmly, overhead, 

The stars like saints in glory meet : 
While hid in solitude sublime, 

Methinks I muse on Nature's tomb. 
And hear the passing foot of Time 

Step through the gloom. 

All in a moment, crash on crash. 

From precipice to precipice, 
An avalanche's ruins dash 

Down to the nethermost abyss ; 
Invisible, the ear alone 

Follows the uproar till it dies ; 
Echo on echo, groan for groan. 

From deep to deep replies. 

Silence again the darkness seals, — 

Darkness that may be felt ; — but soon 
The silver-clouded east reveals 

The midnight spectre of the moon ; 
In half-eclipse she lifts her horn, 

Yet, o'er the host of heaven supreme. 
Brings the faint semblance of a morn 

With her awakeninsr beam. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



Ha ! at her touch, these Alpine heights 

Unreal mockeries appear ; 
With blacker shadows, ghastlier lights, 

Enlarging as she climbs the sphere ; 
A crowd of apparitions pale ! 

I hold my breath in chill suspense, 
— They seem so exquisitely frail, — 

Lest they should vanish hence. 

I breathe again, I freely breathe ; 

Lake of Geneva ! thee I trace. 
Like Dian's crescent far beneath. 

And beautiful as Dian's face. 
Pride of this land of liberty ! 

All that thy waves reflect I love ; 
Where heaven itself, brought down to thee, 

Looks fairer than above. 

Safe on thy banks again I stray, 

The trance of poesy is o'er. 
And I am here at dawn of day, 

Gazing on mountains as before ; 
For all the strange mutations wrought 

Were magic feats of my own mind ; 
Thus, in the fairy-land of thought, 

Whate'er I seek I find. 

Yet, O ye everlasting hills ! 

Buildings of God not made with hands. 
Whose word performs whate'er He wills. 

Whose word, though ye shall perish, stands 
Can there be eyes that look on you. 

Till tears of rapture made them dim, 
Nor in his works the Maker view, 

Then lose his works in Him ? 

By me, when I behold Him not, 
Or love Him not when I behold. 

Be all I ever knew forgot ; 

My pulse stand still, my heart grow cold ; 



Transform'd to ice, 'iwixt earth and sky, 
On yonder cliff my form be seen, 

That all may ask, but none reply, 
What my offence hath been. 



THE BRIDAL AND THE BURIAL. 

" Blessed is the bride whom the sun shines on ; 
Blessed is the corpse which the rain rains on." 

I saw thee young and beautiful, 

I saw thee rich and gay, 

In the first blush of womanhood, 

Upon thy wedding-day : 

The church-bells rang, 

And the little children sang, — 

" Flowers, flowers, kiss her feet ; 

Sweets to the sweet ; 

The winter's past, the rains are gone ; 

Blessed is the bride whom the sun shines on." 

I saw thee poor and desolate, 

I saw thee fade away. 

In broken-hearted widowhood, 

Before thy locks were gray ; 

The death-bell rang, 

And the little children sang, — 

" Lilies, dress her winding-sheet ; 

Sweets to the sweet ; 

The summer's past, the sunshine gone ; 

Blessed is the corpse which the rain rains on." 

" Blessed is the bride whom the sun shines on ; 
Blessed is the corpse which the rain rains on." 




YOUTH RENEWED. 

Spring-flowers, spring-birds, si>ring-breezes, 

Are felt, and heard, and seen ; 
Light tremUing transport seizes 

My heart, — with sighs between ; 
These old enchantments fill the mind 
With scenes and seasons far behind ; 
Childhood, its smiles and tears, 
Youth, Avith its flush of years, 
Its morning clouds and dewy prime, 
More exquisitely touch'd by Time. 

Fancies again are springing. 

Like May-flowers in the vales ; 
While hopes, long lost, are singing. 

From thorns, like nightingales ; 
And kindly spirits stir my blood, 
Like vernal airs that curl the flood : 
There falls to manhood's lot 
A joy, which youth has not, 
A dream more beautiful than truth, 
— Returning Spring renewing Youth. 

Thus sweetly to surrender 

The present for the past ; 
In sprightly mood, yet tender. 

Life's burden down to cast, 
— This is to taste, from stage to stage, 
Youth on the lees refined by age : 
Like wine Avell kept and long, 
Heady, nor harsh, nor strong, 
With every annual cup, is quaff^'d 
A richer, purer, mellower draught. 

Ilarrovgate, 1825. 



THE DAISY IN INDIA. 



THE DAISY IN INDIA. 



The simple history of these stanzas is the following. A friend of mine, a scientific 
botanist, residing near Sheffield, had sent a package of sundry kinds of British 
seeds to the learned and venerable Doctor William Carey, one of the first 
Baptist Missionaries to India, where they had established themselves in the 
small Danish settlement of Serampore, in the province of Bengal. Some of 
the seeds had been enclosed in a bag, containing a portion of their native 
earth. In March, 1821, a letter of acknowledgment was received by his corres- 
pondent from the Doctor, who was himself well skilled in botany, and had a 
garden rich in plants, both tropical and European. In this enclosure, he was 
wont to spend an hour every morning, before he entered upon those labours 
and studies which have rendered his name illustrious both at home and abroad, 
as one of the most accomplished of oriental scholars, and a translator of the 
Holy Scriptures into many of the Hindoo languages. In the letter afore-men- 
tioned, which was shown to me, the good man says, — "That I might be sure 
not to lose any part of your valuable present, I shook the bag over a patch of 
earth in a shady place: on visiting which, a few days afterwards, I found 
springing up, to my inexpressible delight, a bellis perennis of our English 
pastures. I know not that I ever enjoyed, since leaving Europe, a simple 
pleasure so exquisite as the sight of this English Daisy afforded me ; not 
having seen one for upwards of thirty years, and never expecting to see one 
again." 

On the perusal of this passage, the following stanzas seemed to spring up almost 
spontaneously in my mind, as the " little English Flower" in the good Doctor's 
garden, whom I imagined to be thus addressing it on its sudden appearance. — 
With great care and attention he was able to perpetuate "the Daisy in India," 
as an annual only, raised by seed from season to season. It may be observed 
that, amidst the luxuriance of tropical vegetation, there are comparatively 
few small plants, like the multifarious progeny of our native Flora. 

There is a beautiful coincidence between a Aict and a fiction in this circum- 
stance. Among the many natural and striking expedients by which the inge- 
nious author of Robinson Crusoe contrives to supply his hero on the desolate 
island with necessaries and comforts of life, not indigenous, we are informed, 
that Crusoe one day, long after his shipwreck and residence there, perceived 
some delicate blades of vegetation peeping forth, after the rains, on a patch of 
ground near his dwelling-place. Not knowing what they were, he watched 
their growth from day to day, till he ascertained, to his "inexpressible delight," 
that they were plants of some kind of English corn. He then recollected 
having shaken out on that spot the dusty refuse of "a bag" which had been 
used to hold grain for the fowls on shipboard. " With great care and atten- 
tion," he was enabled to preserve the precious stalks till the full corn ripened 
in the ear. He then reaped the first fruits of this spontaneous harvest, sowed 
them again, and, till his release from captivity there, ate bread in his lonely 
abode, 

" Placed far amid the melancholy main." 

Thrice welcome, little English flower ! 
My mother-country's white and, red, 
In rose or hly, till this hour, 
Never to me such beauty spread : 



Transplanted from thine island-bed, 
A treasure in a grain of earth, 
Strange as a spirit from the dead. 
Thine embryo sprang to birth. 

Thrice welcome, little English flower ! 
Whose tribes, beneath our natal skies. 
Shut close their leaves while vapours lower; 
But, when the sun's gay beams arise, 
With unabash'd but modest eyes, 
Follow his motion to the west. 
Nor cease to gaze till dayhght dies. 
Then fold themselves to rest. 

Thrice welcome, little English flower ! 
To this resplendent hemisphere. 
Where Flora's giant offspring tower 
In gorgeous liveries all the year : 
Thou, only thou, art little here, 
Like worth unfriended and unknown, 
Yet to my British heart more dear 
Than all the torrid zone. 

Thrice welcome, little English flower ! 

Of early scenes beloved by me. 

While happy in my father's bower. 

Thou shalt the blithe memorial be ; 

The fairy sports of infancy. 

Youth's golden age, and manhood's prime. 

Home, country, kindred, friends, — with thee, 

I find in this far clime. 

Thrice welcome, little English flower! 

I'll rear thee with a trembling hand : 

Oh, for the April sun and shower. 

The sweet May dews of that fair land. 

Where Daisies, thick as star-light, stand 

In every walk ! — that here may shoot 

Thy scions, and thy buds expand, 

A hundred from one root. 



Thrice welcome, little English flower ! 
To me the pledge of hope unseen : 
When sorrow would my soul o'erpower, 
For joys that were, or might have been, 
I'll call to mind, how, fresh and green, 
I saw thee waking from the dust ; 
Then turn to heaven with brow serene, 
And place in God my trust. 



THE PILGRIM. 



How blest the Pilgrim, who in trouble 

Can lean upon a bosom-friend ; 

Strength, courage, hope with him redouble, 

When foes assail, or griefs impend ; 

Care flees before his footsteps, straying, 

At daybreak, o'er the purple heath ; 

He plucks the wild flowers round him playing, 

And binds their beauty in a wreath. 

More dear to him the fields and mountains. 
When with his friend abroad he roves. 
Rests in the shade near sunny fountains. 
Or talks by moonlight through the groves : 
For him the vine expands its clusters. 
Spring wakes for him her woodland quire ; 
Yea, when the storm of winter blusters, 
'Tis summer round his evening fire. 

In good old age serenely dying, 

When all he loved forsakes his view, 

Sweet is affection's voice replying, 

" I follow soon," to his " Adieu !" 

Even then, though earthly ties are riven, 

The spirit's union will not end ; 

— Happy the man, whom Heaven hath given, 

In life and death, a faithful friend. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



ROBERT BURNS. 

What bird, in beauty, flight, or song, 

Can with the Bard compare, 
Who sang as sweet, and soar'd as strong. 

As ever child of air ? 

His plume, his note, his form, could Burns 
For whim or pleasure change ; 

He was not one, but all by turns, 
With transmigration strange. 

The Blackbird, oracle of spring, 

When flow'd his moral lay ; 
The Swallow wheeling on the wing, 

Capriciously at play : 

The Humming-bird, from bloom to bloom. 

Inhaling heavenly balm ; 
The Raven, in the tempest's gloom ; 

The Halcyon, in the calm : 

In " auld Kirk Alloway," the Owl, 

At Avitching time of night ; 
By " bonnie Doon," the earliest Fowl 

That caroU'd to the light. 

He was the Wren amidst the grove. 

When in his homely vein ; 
At Bannockburn the Bird of Jove, ■ 

With thunder in his train : 

The Woodlark, in his mournful hours ; 

The Goldfinch, in liis mirth ; 
TJie Thrush, a spendthrift of his powers, 

Enrapturing heaven and earth ; 

The Swan, in majesty and grace, 
Contemplative and still : 



THE STRANGER AND HIS FRIEND. 



But roused, — no Falcon, in the chase, 
Could like his satire kill. 

The Linnet in simplicity, 

In tenderness the Dove ; 
But more than all beside was he 

The Nightingale in love. 

Oh ! had he never stoop 'd to shame, 

Nor lent a charm to vice, 
How had Devotion loved to name 

That Bird of Paradise ! 

Peace to the dead ! — In Scotia's choir 
Of Minstrels great and small, 

He sprang from his spontaneous fire. 
The Phoenix of them all. 



THE STRANGER AND HIS FRIEND. 

"Ye have done it unto me." — Matt. xxv. 40. 

A POOR wayfaring Man of grief 

Hath often cross'd me on my way, 
Who sued so humbly for reHef, 

That I could never answer " Nay :" 
I had not power to ask his name. 
Whither he went, or whence he came. 
Yet was there something in his eye 
That won my love, I knew not why. 

Once, when my scanty meal was spread, 
He enter'd ; — not a word he spake ; — 
Just perishing for want of bread ; 

I gave him all ; he bless'd it, brake. 
And ate, — but gave me part again ; 
Mine was an Angel's portion then. 
For while I fed with eager haste. 
That crust was manna to my taste. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



I spied him, where a fountain burst 

Clear from the rock ; his strength was gone ; 

The heedless water mock'd his thirst, 
He heard it, saw it hurrying on : 

I ran to raise the sufferer up ; 

Thrice from the stream he drain'd my cup. 

Dipt, and retum'd it running o'er ; 

I drank, and never thirsted more. 

'Twas night ; the floods were out; it blew 

A winter hurricane aloof; 
I heard his voice abroad, and flew 

To bid him welcome to my roof; 
I warm'd, I clothed, I cheer'd my guest, 
Laid him on my own couch to rest ; 
Then made the hearth my bed, and seem'd 
In Eden's garden vvhile I dreajn'd. 

Stript, wounded, beaten, nigh to death, 
I found him by the highway-side : 

I roused his pulse, brought back his breath, 
Revived his spirit, and supplied 

Wine, oil, refreshment ; he was heal'd ; 

— I had myself a wound conceal'd ; 

But from that hour forgot the smart. 

And Peace bound up my broken heart. 

In prison I saw him next, condemn'd 
To meet a traitor's doom at morn ; 

The tide of lying tongues I stemm'd. 

And honour'd him midst shame and scorn : 

My friendship's utmost zeal to try. 

He ask'd if I for him would die ; 

The flesh was weak, my blood ran chill, 

But the free spirit cried, " I will." 

Then in a moment to my view. 

The Stranger darted from disguise ; 

The tokens in his hands I knew. 
My Saviour stood before mine eyes : 



He spake ; and my poor name He named 
" Of me thou hast not been ashamed : 
These deeds shall thy memorial be ; 
Fear not, thou didst them unto Me." 

Scarborough, Decevtber, 1826. 



FRIENDS. 

Friend after friend departs : 

Who hath not lost a friend ? 
There is no union here of hearts, 

That finds not here an end : 
Were this frail world our only rest. 
Living or dying, none were blest. 

Beyond the flight of Time, 

Beyond this vale of death, 
There surely is some blessed clime. 

Where life is not a breath. 
Nor life's affections transient fire. 
Whose sparks fly upward to expire. 

There is a world above. 

Where parting is unknown ; 
A whole eternity of love, 

Form'd for the good alone ; 
And faith beholds the dying here 
Translated to that happier sphere. 

Thus star by star declines. 

Till all are pass'd away, 
As morning high and higher shines 

To pure and perfect day ; 
Nor sink those stars in empty night, 
— They hide themselves in heaven's own light. 



A THEME FOR A POET. 

1814. 

Written in contemplation of a Poem on the Evangelization of one of the most 
degraded tribes of heathens. This the Author some years afterwards attempt- 
ed, and partly executed, in "Greenland," in five cantos, of which the follow- 
ing were the opening lines, but withdrawn, as inapplicable to the unfinished 
work when it was published. 

Give me a theme to grace an Angel's tongue, 
A theme to which a lyre was never strung; 
Barbarian hordes, by Satan's craft enthrall'd, 
From chains to freedom, guilt to glory call'd; 
The deeds of men unfriended and unknown, 
Sent forth by Him who loves and saves his own. 
With faithful toil a barren land to bless. 
And feed his flocks amid the wilderness. 

These lines were afterwards adopted as a motto to the second volume of the 
last edition of Crantz's Greenland, including the history of the Missions of the 
Moravian Brethren there, which was begun in the year 1733. (See also the 
notes to "Greenland.") 

The arrow that shall lay me low, 

Was shot from Death's unerring bow, 

The moment of my breath ; 

And every footstep I proceed, 

It tracks me with increasing speed ; 

I turn, — it meets me, — Death 

Has given such impulse to that dart, 

It points for ever at my heart. 

And soon of me it must be said. 

That I have lived, that I am dead ; 

Of all I leave behind, 

A few may weep a little while. 

Then bless my memory with a smile : 

What monument of mind 

Shall I bequeath to deathless Fame, 

That after-times may love my name ? 



A THEME FOR A POET. 349 

Let Southey sing of war's alarms, 
The pride of battle, din of arms, 
The glory and the guilt, — 
Of nations barb'rously enslaved, 
Of realms by patriot valour saved, 
Of blood insanely spilt, 
And millions sacrificed to fate. 
To make one little mortal great. 

Let Scott, in wilder strains, delight 

To chant the Lady and the Knight, 

The tournament, the chase. 

The wizard's deed without a name, 

Perils by ambush, flood, and flame; 

Or picturesquely trace 

The hills that form a world on high, 

The lake that seems a downward sky. 

Let Byron, with untrembhng hand. 
Impetuous foot, and fiery brand 
Lit at the flames of hell. 
Go down and search the human heart, 
Till fiends from every corner start, 
Their crimes and plagues to tell ; 
Then let him fling the torch away, 
And sun his soul in heaven's pure day. 

Let Wordsworth weave, in mystic rhyme 

Feelings ineffably sublime, 

And sympathies unknown ; 

Yet so our yielding breasts enthral. 

His Genius shall possess us all, 

His thoughts become our own, 

And strangely pleased, we start to find 

Such hidden treasures in our mind. 

Let Campbell's sweeter numbers flow 
Through every change of joy and wo ; 
Hope's morning dreams display. 
The Pennsylvanian cottage wild. 



The frenzy of O'Connor's child, 
Or Linden's dreadful day ; 
And still in each new form appear 
To every Muse and Grace more dear. 

Transcendent Masters of the lyre ! 
Not to your honours I aspire ; 
Humbler yet higher views 
Have touch'd my spirit into flame : 
The pomp of fiction I disclaim ; 
Fair Truth ! be thou my muse ; 
Reveal in splendour deeds obscure, 
Abase the proud, exalt the poor. 

I sing the men who left their home, 
Amidst barbarian hordes to roam, 
Who land and ocean cross'd, 
Led by a load-star, mark'd on high 
By Faith's unseen, all-seeing eye, — 
To seek and save the lost ; 
Where'er the curse on Adam spread, 
To call his offspring from the dead. 

Strong in the great Redeemer's name. 
They bore the cross, despised the shame ; 
And, like their Master here. 
Wrestled with danger, pain, distress. 
Hunger, and cold, and nakedness, 
And every form of fear ; 
To feel his love their only joy. 
To tell that love their sole employ. 

O Thou, who wast in Bethlehem born. 

The Man of sorrows and of scorn, 

Jesus, the sinners' Friend ! 

— O Thou, enthroned in filial right. 

Above all creature-power and might ; 

Whose kingdom shall extend, 

Till earth, like heaven, thy name shall fill. 

And men, like angels, do thy will : — 



Thou, whom I love, but cannot see. 
My Lord, my God ! look down on me ; 
My low affections raise ; 
The spirit of liberty impart, 
Enlarge my soul, inflame my heart, 
And, while I spread thy praise. 
Shine on my path, in mercy shine, 
Prosper my work, and make it thine. 



NIGHT. 

Night is the time for rest ; 

How sweet, when labours close, 
To gather round an aching breast 

The curtain of repose. 
Stretch the tired hmbs, and lay the head 
Down on our own delightful bed ! 

Night is the time for dreams ; 

The gay romance of life. 
When truth that is, and truth that seems. 

Mix in fantastic strife : 
A'h ! visions, less beguiling far 
Than waking dreams by dayhght are ! 

Night is the time for toil ; 

To plough the classic field. 
Intent to find the buried spoil 

Its wealthy furrows yield ; 
Till all is ours that sages taught. 
That poets sang, and heroes wrought. 

Night is the time to weep ; 

To wet with unseen tears 
Those graves of memory, where sleep 

The joys of other years ; 



Hopes, that were Angels at their hirth, 
But died when young, like things of earth. 

Night is the time to watch ; 

O'er ocean's dark expanse, 
To hail the Pleiades, or catch 

The full moon's earliest glance, 
That brings into the home-sick mind 
All we have loved and left behind. 

Night is the time for care ; 

Brooding on hours misspent, 
To see the spectre of Despair 

Come to our lonely tent ; 
Like Brutus, 'midst his slumbering host, 
Summon'd to die by Caesar's ghost. 

Night is the time to think ; 

When, from the eye, the soul 
Takes flight, and, on the utmost brink 

Of yonder starry pole. 
Discerns beyond the abyss of night 
The daAvn of uncreated light. 

Night is the time to pray ; 

Our Saviour oft withdrew 
To desert mountains far away; 

So will his folloAvers do. 
Steal from the throng to haunts untrod, 
And commune there alone with God. 

Night is the time for Death ; 

When all around is peace. 
Calmly to yield the weary breath. 

From sin and suffering cease. 
Think of heaven's bhss, and give the sign 
To parting friends ; — such death be mine ! 

Harrowgate, September, 1621. 



ASPIRATIONS OF YOUTH. 



ASPIRATIONS OF YOUTH. 

Higher, higher will we climb 

Up the mount of glory, 
That our names may live through time 

In our country's story ; 
Happy, when her welfare calls, 
He who conquers, he who falls. 

Deeper, deeper let us toil 
In the mines of knowledge ; 

Nature's wealth and learning's spoil 
Win from school and college ; 

Delve we there for richer gems 

Than the stars of diadems. 

Onward, onward will we press 
Through the path of duty ; 

Virtue is true happiness. 
Excellence true beauty ; 

Minds are of supernal birth, 

Let us make a heaven of earth. 

Close and closer then we knit 
Hearts and hands together. 

Where our fire-side comforts sit 
In the wildest weather : 

Oh ! they Avander wide, who roam, 

For the joys of life, from home. 

Nearer, nearer bands of love 

Draw our souls in union, 
To our Father's house above, 

To the saints' communion ; 
Thither every hope ascend, 
There may all our labours end. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS-. 



A HERMITAGE. 

Whose is this humble dweUing-place, 
The flat turf-roof with flowers o'ergrown ? 

Ah ! here the tenant's name I trace, 
Moss-cover'd, on the threshold stone. 

Well, he has peace within, and rest, 
Though nought of all the world beside ; 

Yet, stranger, deem not him unblest, 
Who knows not avarice, lust, or pride. 

Nothing he asks, nothing he cares 
For all that tempts or troubles round ; 

He craves no feast, no finery wears. 
Nor once o'ersteps his narrow bound. 

No need of light, though all be gloom, 
To cheer his eye, — that eye is blind ; 

No need of fire in this small room, 
He recks not tempest, rain, or wind. 

No gay companions here ; no wife 

To gladden home with true-love smiles ; 

No children, — from the woes of life 
To win him with their artless wiles. 

Nor joy, nor sorrow, enter here. 

Nor throbbing heart, nor aching hmb ; 

No sun, no moon, no stars appear. 

And man and brute are nought to him. 

This dwelling is a hermit's cave, 
With space alone for one poor bed ; 

This dwelling is a mortal's grave, 
Its sole inhabitant is dead. 



INSCRIPTION 

UNDER THE PICTURE OF AN AGED NEGRO WOMAN. 

Art thou a woman ? — so am I ; and all 
That woman can be, I have been, or am ; 
A daughter, sister, consort, mother, widow. 
Whiche'er of these thou art, Oh ! be the friend 
Of one who is what thou canst never be ! 
Look on thyself, thy kindred, home, and country, 
Then fall upon thy knees, and cry " Thank God, 
An English woman cannot be a SLAVE !" 

Art thou a man? — Oh ! I have known, have loved. 
And lost, all that to woman man can be ; 
A father, brother, husband, son, who shared 
My bliss in freedom, and my wo in bondage. 
— A childless widow now, a friendless slave. 
What shall I ask of thee, since I have nought 
To lose but life's sad burden : nought to gain 
But heaven's repose ? — these are beyond thy power ; 
Me thou canst neither wrong nor help ; — what then ? 
Go to the bosom of thy family, 
Gather thy little children round thy knees. 
Gaze on their innocence ; their clear, full eyes, 
All fix'd on thine ; and in their mother, mark 
The loveliest look that woman's face can wear, 
Her look of love, beholding them and thee : 
Then, at the altar of your household joys. 
Vow one by one, vow altogether, vow 
With heart and voice, eternal enmity 
Against oppression by your brethren's hands : 
Till man nor woman under Britain's laws, 
Nor son nor daughter born within her empire, 
Shall buy, or sell, or hold, or be a slave. 

Scarhorovgh, December, 1620, 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



THE ADVENTURE OF A STAR. 

ADDRESSED TO A YOUNG LADY. 

A Star would be a flower ; 

So down from heaven it came, 

And in a honeysuckle bower 

Lit up its httle flame. 

There on a bank, beneath the shade, 

By sprays, and leaves, and blossoms made. 

It overlook'd the garden-ground, 

— A landscape stretching ten yards round ; 

Oh what a change of place 

From gazing through th' eternity of space ! 

Gay plants on every side 

Unclosed their lovely blooms. 

And scatter'd far and wide 

Their ravishing perfumes : 

The butterfly, the bee, 

And many an insect on the Aving, 

Full of the spirit of the spring. 

Flew round and round in endless glee, 

Alighting here, ascending there. 

Ranging and revelhng everywhere. 

Now all the flowers were up and drest 

In robes of rainbow-colour'd light ; 

The pale primroses look'd their best. 

Peonies blush'd with all their might ; 

Dutch tulips from their beds 

Flaunted their stately heads ; 

Auriculas, like belles and beaux, 

Ghttering with birthnight splendour, rose; 

And polyanthuses display'd 

The brilliance of their gold brocade : 

Here hyacinths of heavenly blue 

Shook their rich tresses to the mom. 



ADVENTURE OF A STAR. 



While rose-buds scarcely show'd their hue, 

But coyly linger'd on the thorn, 

Till their loved nightingale, who tarried long. 

Should wake them into beauty with his song. 

The violets were past their prime, 

Yet their departing breath 

Was sweeter, in the blast of death, 

Than all the lavish fragrance of the time. 

Amidst this gorgeous train, 

Our truant star shone forth in vain ; 

Though in a wreath of periwinkle. 

Through whose fine gloom it strove to twinkle, 

It seem'd no bigger to the view 

Than the light spangle in a drop of dew. 

— Astronomers may shake their polls, 

And tell me, — every orb that rolls 

Through heaven's sublime expanse 

Is sun or world, whose speed and size 

Confound the stretch of mortal eyes. 

In Nature's mystic dance : 

It may be so 

For aught I know. 

Or aught indeed that they can show ; 

Yet till they prove Avhat they aver. 

From this plain truth I will not stir, 

— A star's a star ! — but when I think / 

Of sun or world, the star I sink ; 

Wherefore in verse, at least in mine, 

Stars like themselves, in spite of fate, shall shine. 

Now to return (for we have wandered far) 

To what was nothing but a simple star ; 

— Where all was jolhty around, 

No fellowship the stranger found. 

Those lowliest children of the earth, 

That never leave their mother's lap, 

Companions in their harmless mirth, 

Were smiling, blushing, dancing there. 

Feasting on dew, and light, and air. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



And fearing no mishap, 

Save from the hand of lady fair, 

Who, on her wonted walk, 

Pluck'd one and then another, 

A sister or a brother. 

From its elastic stalk ; 

Happy, no doubt, for one sharp pang to die 

On her sweet bosom, withering in her eye. 

Thus all day long that star's hard lot. 

While bhss and beauty ran to waste. 

Was but to witness on the spot 

Beauty and bliss it could not taste. 

At length the sun went down, and then 

Its faded glory came again ; 

With brighter, bolder, purer light. 

It kindled through the deepening night, 

Till the green bower, so dim by day, 

Glow'd like a fairy-palace with its beams ; 

In vain, for sleep on all the borders lay. 

The flowers were laughing in the land of dreams. 

Our star, in melancholy state. 

Still sigh'd to find itself alone. 

Neglected, cold, and desolate. 

Unknowing and unknown. 

Lifting at last an anxious eye. 

It saw that circlet empty in the sky 

Where it was wont to roll 

Within a hair-breadth of the pole : 

In that same instant, sore amazed. 

On the strange blank all Nature gazed ; 

Travellers bewilder'd for their guide. 

In glens and forests lost their way ; 

And ships, on ocean's trackless tide, 

Went fearfully astray. 

The star, now wiser for its folly, knew 

Its duty, dignity, and bliss at home ; 

So up to heaven again it flew, 

Resolved no more to roam. 



One hint the humble bard may send 

To her for whom these lines are penn'd ; 

O may it be enough for her 

To shine in her own character ! 

O may she be content to grace, 

On earth, in heaven, her proper place ! 



ON PLANTING A TULIP-ROOT. 

Here lies a bulb, the child of earth. 

Buried alive beneath the clod, 
Ere long to spring, by second birth, 

A new and nobler work of God. 

'Tis said that microscopic power 

Might through its swaddling folds descry 

The infant image of the flower. 
Too exquisite to meet the eye. 

This, vernal suns and rains will swell. 

Till from its dark abode it peep. 
Like Venus rising from her shell. 

Amidst the spring-tide of the deep. 

Two shapely leaves will first unfold. 

Then, on a smooth elastic stem. 
The verdant bud shall turn to gold, 

And open in a diadem. 

Not one of Flora's brilliant race 

A form rhore perfect can display ; 
Art could not feign more simple grace, 

Nor Nature take a line away. 

Yet, rich as morn of many a hue, 

When flushing clouds through darkness strike. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



The tulip's petals shine in dew, 
All beautiful, — but none alike. 

Kings, on their bridal, might unrobe 
To lay their glories at its foot ; 

And queens their sceptre, crown, and globe, 
Exchange for blossom, stalk, and root. 

Here could I stand and moralize ; 

Lady, I leave that part to thee ; 
Be thy next birth in Paradise, 

Thy life to come eternity ! 



THE DROUGHT. 

WRITTEN IN THE SUMMER OF 1826. 
Hosea, ii. 21, 22. 

What strange, what fearful thing hath come to pass? 

The ground is iron, and the heavens are brass ; 

Man on the withering harvests casts his eye, 

" Give me your fruits in season, or I die ;" 

The timely Fruits implore their parent Earth, 

" Where is thy strength to bring us forth to birth ?" 

The Earth, all prostrate, to the clouds complains, 

" Send to my heart your fertilizing rains ;" 

The Clouds invoke the Heavens, — " Collect, dispense 

Through us your quickening, healing influence;" 

The Heavens to Him that made them raise their moan, 

" Command thy blessing, and it shall be done ;" 

The Lord is in his temple : — hush'd and still. 

The suppliant Universe awaits his will. 

He speaks ; and to the Clouds the Heavens dispense. 
With lightning-speed, their genial influence ; 
The gathering, breaking Clouds pour down their rains. 
Earth drinks the bliss through all her eager veins : 



THK DROUGHT. 



From teeming furrows start the Fruits to birth, 
x4n(i shake their treasures on the lap of Earth ; 
Man sees the harvests grow beneath his eye. 
Turns, and looks up with rapture to the sky ; 
All that have breath and being now rejoice ; 
All Nature's voices blend in one great voice, 
" Glory to God, who thus himself makes known '." 
— When shall all tongues confess Him God alone ? 

Lord ! as the rain comes down from Heaven, — the rain 
Which waters Earth, nor thence returns in vain, 
But makes the tree to bud, the grass to spring. 
And feeds and gladdens every living thing, — 
So may thy word, upon a world destroy'd. 
Come down in blessing, and return not void ; 
So may it come in universal showers. 
And fill Earth's dreariest wilderness with flowers, 
— With flowers of promise fill the world, withia 
Man's heart, laid waste and desolate by sin ; 
Where thorns and thistles curse the infested ground, 
Let the rich fruits of righteousness abound ; 
And trees of life, for ever fresh and green. 
Flourish where trees of death alone have been ; 
Let Truth look down from heaven, Hope soar above, 
Justice and Mercy kiss. Faith work by Love ; 
Nations new-born their fathers' idols spurn ; 
The Ransom'd of the Lord with songs return ; 
Heralds the year of Jubilee proclaim ; 
Bow every knee at the Redeemer's name ; 
O'er lands, with darkness, thraldom, guilt, o'erspread, 
In light, joy, freedom, be the Spirit shed ; 
Speak Thou the word : to Satan's power say, " Cease," 
But to a world of pardon'd sinners, "Peace." 
— Thus in thy grace. Lord God, Thyself make known : 
Then shall all tongues confess Thee God alone. 



31 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



THE FALLING LEAF. 

Were I a trembling leaf, 

On yonder stately tree, 
After a season gay and brief, 

Condemn'd to fade and flee : 
I should be loth to fall 

Beside the common way, 
Weltering in mire, and spurn'd by all. 

Till trodden down to clay. 

Nor would I choose to die 

All on a bed of grass, 
Where thousands of my kindred lie. 

And idly rot in mass. 

Nor would I like to spread 

My thin and wither'd face 
In hortus siccus, pale and dead, 

A mummy of my race. 
No, — on the wings of air 

Might I be left to fly, 
I know not and I heed not where, 

A waif of earth and sky ! 
Or flung upon the stream, 

Curl'd like a fairy-boat, 
As through the changes of a dream. 

To the world's end to float ! 
Who that hath ever been. 

Could bear to be no more ? 
Yet who would tread again the scene 

He trod through life before ? 
On, with intense desire, 

Man's spirit will move on : 
It seems to die, yet, like heaven's fire, 

It is not quench'd, but gone. 



Matlock, 1822. 



THOUGHTS AND IMAGES. 

"Come like shadows, so depart." Macbeth. 

The Diamond, in its native bed, 
Hid like a buried star may lie. 
Where foot of man must never tread, 
Seen only by its Maker's eye : 
And though imbued with beams to grace 
His fairest work in woman's face. 
Darkling, its fire may fill the void. 
Where fix'd at first in solid night ; 
Nor, till the world shall be destroy'd. 
Sparkle one moment into light. 

The Plant, upspringing from the seed, 
Expands into a perfect flower ; 
The virgin-daughter of the mead. 
Wooed by the sun, the wind, the shower : 
In loveliness beyond compare. 
It toils not, spins not, knows no care ; 
Train'd by the secret hand, that brings 
All beauty out of waste and rude, 
It blooms its season, dies, and fhngs 
Its germs abroad in solitude. 

Almighty skill, in ocean's caves. 
Lends the light Nautilus a form 
To tilt along the Atlantic waves. 
Fearless of rock, or shoal, or storm ; 
But, should a breath of danger sound. 
With sails quick-furl'd it dives profound, 
And far beneath the tempest's path. 
In coral grots, defies the foe. 
That never brake, in heaviest wrath, 
The sabbath of the deep below. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



Up from his dream, on twinkling wings, 
The Sky-lark soars amid the dawn ; 
Yet, while in Paradise he sings, 
Looks down upon the quiet lawn, 
Where flutters, in his little nest, 
More love than music e'er express'd ; 
Then, though the Nightingale may thrill 
The soul with keener ecstasy. 
The merry bird of morn can fill 
All Nature's bosom with his glee. 

The Elephant, embower'd in woods, 
Coeval with their trees might seem. 
As though he drank from Indian floods 
Life in a renovating stream : 
Ages o'er him have come and fled ; 
Midst generations of the dead. 
His bulk survives to feed and range. 
Where ranged and fed of old his sires ; 
Nor knows advancement, lapse, or change. 
Beyond their walks, till he expires. 

Gem, flower, and fish, the bird, the brute, 
Of every kind occult or known, 
(Each exquisitely form'd to suit 
Its humble lot, and that alone,) 
Through ocean, earth, and air fulfil. 
Unconsciously, their Maker's will. 
Who gave, without their toil or thought. 
Strength, beauty, instinct, courage, speed ; 
While through the Avhole his pleasure wrought 
Whate'er his wisdom had decreed. 

But Man, the master-piece of God, 
Man, in his Maker's image framed, — 
Though kindred to the valley's clod, 
\_,y Lord of this low creation named, — ■ 

In naked helplessness appears. 
Child of a thousand griefs and fears : 



THOUGHTS AND IMAGES. 



To labour, pain, and trouble born, 
Weapon, nor wing, nor sleight hath he ; 
Yet, like the sun, he brings his morn, 
And is a king from infancy. 

For, him no destiny hath bound 
To do what others did before, 
Pace the same dull perennial round. 
And be a man, and be no more : 
A man ? — a self-will' d piece of earth. 
Just as the Hon is, by birth ; 
To hunt his prey, to wake, to sleep. 
His father's joys and sorrows share, 
His niche in Nature's temple keep, 
And leave his Hkeness in his heir ! — 

No ; infinite the shades between 

The motley millions of our race ; 

No two the changing moon hath seen 

Alike in purpose, or in face ; 

Yet all aspire beyond their fate ; 

The least, the meanest, would be great ; 

The mighty future fills the mind. 

That pants for more than earth can give ; 

Man, to this narrow sphere confined. 

Dies when he but begins to live. 

Oh ! if there be no world on high 
To yield his powers unfetter'd scope ; 
If man be only born to die. 
Whence this inheritance of hope ? 
Wherefore to him alone were lent 
Riches that never can be spent ? 
Enough, not more, to all the rest, 
For life and happiness, was given ; 
To man, mysteriously unblest. 
Too much for any state but heaven. 

It is not thus ; — it cannot be. 
That one so gloriously endow'd 



With views that reach eternity, 
Should shine and vanish Hke a cloud : 
Is there a God ! — all Nature shows 
There is, — and yet no mortal knows : 
The mind that could this truth conceive, 
Which brute sensation never taught, 
No longer to the dust would cleave, 
But grow immortal with the thought. 

1819. 



THE AGES OF MAN. 



Youth, fond youth ! to thee, in life's gay morning, 
New and wonderful are heaven and earth ; 

Health the hills, content the fields adorning, 
Nature rings with melody and mirth ; 

Love invisible, beneath, above. 

Conquers all things ; all things yield to love. 

Time, swift time, from years their motion stealing, 
Unperceived hath sober manhood brought ; 

Truth, her pure and humble forms reveahng. 
Peoples fancy's fairy-land with thought ;■ 

Then the heart, no longer prone to roam. 

Loves, loves best, the quiet bHss of home. 

Age, old age, in sickness, pain, and sorrow. 

Creeps with lengthening shadow o'er the scene ; 

Life was yesterday, 'tis death to-morrow. 
And to-day the agony between : 

Then how longs the Aveary soul for thee. 

Bright and beautiful eternity ! 



THE GRAVE. 



THE GRAVE. 

There is a calm for those Avho weep, 
A rest for weary pilgrims found, 
They softly he and sweetly sleep 

Low in the ground. 

The storm that wrecks the winter sky 
No more disturbs their deep repose, 
Than summer-evening's latest sigh 

That shuts the rose. 

I long to lay this painful head 
And aching heart beneath the soil, 
To slumber in that dreamless bed 

From all my toil. 

For misery stole me at my birth, 
And cast me helpless on the wild : 

I perish ; my Mother Earth 

Take home thy Child. 

On thy dear lap these limbs reclined 
Shall gently moulder into thee ; 
Nor leave one wretched trace behind 
Resembling me. 

Hark ! — a strange sound affrights mine ear ; 
My pulse, — my brain runs wild, — I rave ; 
— Ah ! who art thou whose voice I hear ? 

" I am THE GRAVE ! 

' The GRAVE, that never spake before, 
Hath found at length a tongue to chide ;• 
O listen ! — I will speak no more : — 
Be silent, Pride ! 



" Art thou a wretch of hope forlorn, 
The victim of consuming care ? 
Is thy distracted conscience torn 

By fell despair ? 

" Do foul misdeeds of former times 
Wring with remorse thy guilty breast ? 
And ghosts of unforgiven crimes 

Murder thy rest ? 

"Lash'd by the furies of the mind, 
From Wrath and Vengeance wouldst thou flee 
Ah ! think not, hope not, fool, to find 
A friend in me. 

" By all the terrors of the tomb. 
Beyond, the power of tongue to tell ; 
By the dread secrets of my womb ; 

By Death and Hell ; 

" I charge thee, live ! — repent and pray ; 
In dust thine infamy deplore ; 
There yet is mercy ; — go thy way, 

And sin no more. 

" Art thou a mourner ? — Hast thou known 
The joy of innocent delights. 
Endearing days for ever flown. 

And tranquil nights ? 

" O LIVE ! and deeply cherish still 

The sweet remembrance of the past : 
Rely on Heaven's unchanging will 
For peace at last. 

" Art thou a wanderer ? — Hast thou seen 
O'erwhelming tempests drown thy bark ? 
A shipwreck'd sufferer hast thou been, 
Misfortune's mark ? 



THE GRAVE. 



" Though long of winds and waves the sport, 
Condemn'd in wretchedness to roam, 
Live ! — thou shalt reach a shehering port, 
A quiet home. 

" To FRIENDSHIP didst thou trust thy fame, 
And was thy friend a deadly foe. 
Who stole into thy breast to aim 
A surer blow ? 

" Live ! — and repine not o'er his loss, 
A loss unworthy to be told : 
Thou hast mistaken sordid dross 

For friendship's gold. 

" Seek the true treasure, seldom found, 
Of power the fiercest griefs to calm, 
And soothe the bosom's deepest wound 
With heavenly balm. 

" Did woman's charms thy youth beguile. 
And did the Fair One faithless prove ? 
Hath she betray'd thee with a smile. 
And sold thy love ? 

" Live ! — 'Twas a false bewildering fire : 
Too often Love's insidious dart 
Thrills the fond soul with wild desire, 
But kills the heart. 

" Thou yet shalt know, how sweet, how dear 
To gaze on listening Beauty's eye ; 
To ask, — and pause in hope and fear 
Till she reply. 

" A nobler flame shall warm thy breast, 
A brighter maiden faithful prove ; 
Thy youth, thine age, shall yet be blest 
In woman's love. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



" Whate'er thy lot, — ^whoe'er thou be,— 

Confess thy folly, — ^kiss the rod, 
And in thy chastening sorrow see 

The hand of God. 

" A bruised reed He will not break ; 
Afflictions all his children feel : 
He wounds them for his mercy's sake, 
He wounds to heal. 

"Humbled beneath his mighty hand, 
Prostrate his Providence adore : 
'Tis done ! — ^Arise ! He bids thee stand, 
To fall no more. 

" Now, Traveller in the vale of tears. 
To realms of everlasting light. 
Through Time's dark wilderness of years 
Pursue thy fhght. 

" There is a calm for those who weep, 
A rest for weary Pilgrims found ; 
And while the mouldering ashes sleep 
Low in the ground 

" The Soul, of origin divine, 
God's glorious image, freed from clay. 
In heaven's eternal sphere shall shine 
A star of day. 

" The SUN is but a spark of fire, 
A transient meteor in the sky ; 
The SOUL, immortal as its Sire, 

SHALL NEVER DIE." 

18<M. 



BOLEHILL TREES. a^l 



BOLEHILL TREES. 

A conspicuous plantation, encompassing a scbool-liouse and play-ground, on a 
bleak eminence, at Barlow, in Derbyshire: on the one hand facing the high 
moors ; on the other, overlooking a richly-cultivated, well-wooded, and moun- 
tainous country, near the seat of a gentlemen where the writer has spent 
many happy hours. 

Now peace to his ashes who planted yon trees, 

That welcome my wandering eye ! 
In lofty luxuriance they wave with the hreeze, 

And resemble a grove in the sky ; 
On the brow of the mountain, uncultured and bleak, 

They flourish in grandeur sublime. 
Adorning its bald and majestical peak, 

Like the lock on the forehead of Time. 

A land-mark they rise ; — to the stranger forlorn 

All night on the wild heath delay'd, 
'Tis rapture to spy the young beauties of morn 

Unveiling behind their dark shade : 
The homeward-bound husbandman joys to behold. 

On the hne of the gray evening scene, 
Their branches yet gleaming with purple and gold, 

And the sunset expiring between. 

The maidens that gather the fruits of the moor,* 

While weary and fainting they roam. 
Through the blue dazzling distance of noon-light explore 

The trees that remind them of home : 
The children that range in the valley suspend 

Their sports and in ecstasy gaze. 
When they see the broad moon from the summit ascend. 

And their school-house and grove in a bla?e. 

Oh ! sweet to my soul is that beautiful grove. 
Awakening remembrance most dear ; — 

* Bilherrics, cluster-liL'rries, and crane-berries. 



78 MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 

When lonely in anguish and exile I rove, 

Wherever its glories appear, 
It gladdens my spirit, it soothes from afar 

With tranquil and tender deHght, 
It shines through my heart, like a hope-beaming star, 

Alone in the desert of night. 

It tells me of moments of innocent bliss. 

For ever and ever gone o'er ; 
Like the Hght of a smile, like the balm of a kiss, 

They were, — but they will be no more : 
Yet wherefore of pleasures departed complain, 

That leave such endearment behind? 
Though the sun of their sweetness be sunk in the main, 

Their twilight still rests on the mind. 

Then peace to his ashes who planted those trees ! 

Supreme o'er the landscape they rise. 
With simple and lovely magnificence please 

All bosoms, and gladden all eyes : 
Nor marble, nor brass, could emblazon his fame 

Like his own sylvan trophies, that wave 
In graceful memorial, and whisper his name, 

And scatter their leaves on his grave. 

Ah ! thus, when I sleep in the desolate tomb, 

May the laurels I planted endure. 
On the mountain of high immortality bloom, 

Midst lightning and tempest secure ! 
Then ages unborn shall their verdure admire, 

And nations sit under their shade. 
While my spirit, in secret, shall move o'er my lyre. 

Aloft in their branches display'd. 

Hence dream of vain glory ! — the hght drop of dew 

That glows in the violet's eye, 
[n the splendour of morn, to a fugitive view. 

May rival a star of the sky ; 



THE OLD MAN S SONG. 



But the violet is pluck'd, and the dew-drop is flown, 
The star unextinguish'd shall shine : 

Then mine be the laurels of virtue alone, 
And the glories of Paradise mine. 

1807. 



THE OLD MAN'S SONG. 

Shall Man of frail fruition boast ? 

Shall life be counted dear, 
Oft but a moment, and at most 

A momentary year ? 

There was a time, — that time is past, — 
When, youth ! I bloom'd like thee ! 

A time will come, — 'tis coming fast, 
When thou shalt fade like me : — 

Like me through varjdng seasons range, 
And past enjoyments mourn ; — 

The fairest, sweetest spring shall change 
To winter in its turn. 

In infancy, my vernal prime. 

When life itself was new. 
Amusement pluck'd the wings of time, 

Yet swifter still he flew. 

Summer my youth succeeded soon, 

My sun ascended high. 
And pleasure held the reins till noon. 

But grief drove down the sky. 

Like Autumn, rich in ripening corn. 
Came manhood's sober reign ; 

My harvest-moon scarce fill'd her horn, 
When she began to wane. 

Close follow'd age, infirm old age. 
The winter of my year ; 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



When shall I fall before his rage, 
To rise beyond the sphere I 

I long to cast the chains away, 
That hold my soul a slave, 

To burst these dungeon walls of clay. 
Enfranchised from the grave. 

Life lies in embryo, — never free 
Till Nature yields her breath, 

Till Time becomes Eternity, 
And Man is born in Death. 



THE GLOW-WORM. 



The male of this insect is said to be a fly, which the female caterpillar attracts 
in the night by the lustre of her train. 

When Evening closes Nature's eye. 
The Glow-worm hghts her little spark, 

To captivate her favourite fly, 

And tempt the rover through the dark. 

Conducted by a sweeter star, 

Than all that deck the fields above, 

He fondly hastens from afar. 
To soothe her solitude with love. 

Thus in this wilderness of tears, 

Amidst the world's perplexing gloom. 

The transient torch of Hymen cheers 
The pilgrim journeying to the tomb. 

Unhappy he whose hopeless eye 
Turns to the light of love in vain ; 

Whose cynosure is in the sky. 
He on the dark and lonely main. 



THE MOLE-HILL. 



THE MOLE-HILL. 

Tell me, thou dust beneath my feet, 
Thou dust that once hadst breath! 

Tell me how many mortals meet 
In this small hill of death ? 

The mole that scoops with curious toil 

Her subterranean bed, 
Thinks not she ploughs a human soil, 

And mines among the dead. 

But, O ! where'er she turns the ground, 

My kindred earth I see ; 
Once every atom of this mound 

Lived, breathed, and felt, hke me. 

Like me, these elder-born of clay 

Enjoy'd the cheerful light, 
Bore the brief burden of a day. 

And went to rest at night. 

Far in the regions of the morn, 

The rising sun surveys 
Palmyra's palaces forlorn, 

Empurpled with his rays. 

The spirits of the desert dwell 
Where eastern grandeur shone. 

And vultures scream, hyaenas yell 
Round Beauty's mouldering throne. 

There the pale pilgrim, as he stands, 

Sees, from the broken wall. 
The shadow tottering on the sands, 

Ere the loose fragment fall. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



Destruction joys, amid those scenes, 

To watch the sport of Fate, 
While Time between the pillars leans, 

And bows them with his weight. 

But towers and temples crush'd by Time, 

Stupendous wrecks ! appear 
To me less mournfully sublime 

Than the poor Mole-hill here. 

Through all this hillock's trembhng mould. 
Once the warm life-blood ran ; 

Here thine original behold, 
And here thy ruins, Man ! 

Methinks this dust yet heaves with breath ; 

Ten thousand pulses beat ; 
Tell me, — in this small hill of death, 

How many mortals meet ? 

By wafting winds and flooding rains, 

From ocean, earth, and sky, 
Collected here, the frail remains 

Of slumbering millions lie. 

What scene of terror and amaze 
Breaks through the twilight gloom? 

What hand invisible displays 
The secrets of the tomb ? 

All ages and all nations rise, 

And every grain of earth 
Beneath my feet, before mine eyes, 

Is startled into birth. 

Like gliding mists the shadowy forms 
Through the deep valley spread. 

And like descending clouds in storms 
Lower round the mountain's head. 

O'er the wild champaign while they pass. 
Their footsteps yield no sound. 



THE MOLE-HILL. 377 



Nor shake from the light trembling grass 
A dew-drop to the ground. 

Among the undistinguish'd hosts, 

My wondering eyes explore 
Awful, sublime, terrific ghosts. 

Heroes and kings of yore : — 

Tyrants, the comets of their kind, 
Whose withering influence ran 

Through all the promise of the mind, 
And smote and miidew'd man: — 

Sages, the Pleiades of earth. 

Whose genial aspect smiled. 
And flowers and fruitage sprang to birth 
■ O'er all the human wild. 

Yon gloomy ruflian, gash'd and gored, 

Was he, whose fatal skill 
First beat the plough-share to a sword, 

And taught the art to kill. 

Behind him skulks a shade, bereft 

Of fondly worshipt fame ; 
He built the Pyramids, but left 

No stone to tell his name. 

Who is the chief, with visage dark 

As tempests when they roar? 
— The first who push'd his daring bark 

Beyond the timid shore. 

Through storms of death and seas of graves 
He sleer'd with steadfast eye ; 

His path was on the desert waves. 
His compass in the sky. 

That youth who lifts his graceful hand. 

Struck the unshapen block, 
And beauty leap'd, at his command, 

A Venus from tne rock. 



Trembling with ecstasy of thought, 

Behold the Grecian maid, 
Whom love's enchanting impulse itaught 

To trace a slumberer's shade. 

Sweet are the thefts of love ; — she stole 

His image while he lay, 
Kindled the shadow to a soul. 

And breathed that soul through clay. 

Yon listening nymph, who looks behind, 

With countenance of fire, 
Heard midnight music in the wind, — 

And framed the iEoHan lyre. 

All hail ! — The Sire of Song appears 

The Muse's eldest born ; 
The skylark in the dawn of years, 

The poet of the morn. 

He from the depth of cavern'd woods, 

That echoed to his voice, 
Bade mountains, valleys, winds, and floods, 

And earth and heaven rejoice. 

Though charm'd to meekness while he sung. 
The wild beasts round him ran. 

This was the triumph of his tongue, — 
It tamed the heart of man. 

Dim through the mist of twilight times 

The ghost of Cyrus walks ; 
Behind him, red with glorious crimes, 

The son of Ammon stalks. 

Relentless Hannibal, in pride 

Of sworn, fix'd hatred, lowers; 
Caesar,— 'tis Brutus at his side,— • 

In peerless grandeur towers. 

With moonlight softness Helen's charms 

Dissolve the spectred gloom, 



THE MOLE-HILL. 



The leading star of Greece in arms, 
Portending Ilion's doom. 

But* Homer , — see the bard arise ! 

And hark ! — he strikes the lyre ; 
The Dardan warriors hft their eyes, 

The Argive Chiefs respire. 

And while his music rolls along, 

The tOAvers of Troy sublime, 
Raised by the magic breath of song. 

Mock the destroyer Time. 

For still around the eternal walls 

The storms of battle rage : 
And Hector conquers, Hector falls, 

Bewept in every age. 

Genius of Homer ! Were it mine 

To track thy fiery car. 
And in thy sunset course to shine 

A radiant evening star, — 

What theme, what laurel might the Muse 

Reclaim from ages fled ? 
What realm-restoring hero choose 

To summon from the dead ? 

Yonder his shadow flits away : 
— Thou shalt not thus depart ; 

Stay, thou transcendent spirit, stay, 
And tell me who thou art ! 

♦Tis Alfred !— In the rolls of Fame, 

And on the midnight page. 
Blazes his broad refulgent name, 

The watch-light of his age. 

A Danish winter, from the north, 
Howl'd o'er the British wild, 

But Alfred, like the spring, broke forth, 
And all the desert smiled. 



Back to the deep he roU'd the waves, 

By mad invasion hurl'd ; 
His voice was liberty to slaves, 

Defiance to the world. 

And still that voice o'er land and sea 

Shall AlbiQn's foes appal ; 
The race of Alfred will be free ; — 

Hear it, and tremble, Gaul ! 

But lo ! the phantoms fade in flight. 
Like fears that cross the mind, 

Like meteors gleaming through the night, 
Like thunders on the wind. 

The vision of the tomb is past ; 

Beyond it who can tell 
In what mysterious region cast 

Immortal spirits dwell ? 

I know not, but I soon shall know 
When life's sore conflicts cease, 

When this desponding heart lies low. 
And I shall rest in peace. 

For see, on Death's bewildering wave, 

The rainbow Hope arise, 
A bridge of glory o'er the grave. 

That bends beyond the skies. 

From earth to heaven it swells and shines 

The pledge of bliss to Man ; 
Time with Eternity combines, 

And grasps them in a span. 



1807. 




A VOYAGE ROUND THE WORLD. 

Emblem of eternity, 
Unbeginning, endless sea ! 
Let me launch my soul on thee. 

Sail, nor keel, nor helm, nor oar. 

Need I, ask I, to explore 

Thine expanse from shore to shore. 

By a single glance of thought, 

Thy whole realm's before me brought 

Like the universe, from nought. 

All thine aspects now I view, 

Ever old, yet ever new, 

— Time nor tide thy power subdue. 

All thy voices now I hear ; 
Sounds of gladness, grandeur, fear, 
Meet and mingle in mine ear. 

All thy wonders are reveal'd, 
Treasures hidden in thy field. 
From the birth of nature seal'd. 

But thy depths I search not now, 
Nor thy liquid surface plow 
With a billow-breaking prow. 

Eager fancy, unconfined. 
In a voyage of the mind. 
Sweeps along thee like the wind. 

Here a breeze, I skim thy plain, 
There a tempest, pour amain 
Thunder, lightning, hail, and rain. 

Where the surges never roll 
Round the undiscover'd pole. 
Thence set out, my venturous soul ! 



L 



See o'er Greenland, cold and wild, 

Rocks of ice eternal piled, 

— Yet the mother loves her child, — 

And the wildernesses drear, 
To the native's heart are dear ; 
All love's charities dwell here. 

Next on lonely Labrador, 

Let me hear the snow-storms roar, 

Blinding, burying all before. 

Yet even here, in glens and coves, 
Man the heir of all things roves, 
Feasts and fights, and laughs and loves. 

But a brighter vision breaks 
O'er Canadian woods and lakes ; 
— These my spirit soon forsakes. 

Land of exiled liberty. 

Where our fathers once were free. 

Brave New England ! hail to thee ! 

Pennsylvania, while thy flood 
Waters fields unbought with blood. 
Stand for peace, as thou hast stood. 

The West Indies I behold, 
Like th' Hesperides of old, 
— Trees of life with fruits of gold. 

No, — a curse is on their soil, 
Bonds and scourges, tears and toil, 
Man degrade, and earth despoil. 

Horror-struck I turn aAvay, 
Coasting down the Mexique bay, 
— Slavery there hath had her day. 

Hark ! eight hundred thousand tongues 
Startle midnight with strange songs ; 
— England ends her negroes' wrongs. 



Loud the voice of freedom spoke, 
Every accent split a yoke, 
Every word a fetter broke. 

South America expands 
Forest-mountains, river-lands, 
And a nobler race demands. 

And a nobler race arise, 

Stretch their limbs, unclose their eyes. 

Claim the earth, and seek the skies. 

Gliding through Magellan's Straits, 
Where two oceans ope their gates, 
What a glorious scene awaits ! 

The immense Pacific smiles. 
Round ten thousand little isles, 
— Haunts of violence and wiles. 

But the powers of darkness yield. 
For the cross is in the field. 
And the light of hfe reveal'd. 

Rays from rock to rock it darts. 
Conquers adamantine hearts. 
And immortal bhss imparts. 

North and west, receding far 
From the evening's downward star. 
Now I mount Aurora's car ; — 

Pale Siberia's deserts shun, 

From Kamschalka's storm-cHffs run, 

South and east, to meet the sun. 

Jealous China, dire Japan, 

With bewilder'd eyes I scan, 

— They are but dead seas of man. 

Ages in succession find 

Forms that change not, stagnant mind, 

And they leave the same behind. 



384 MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 

Lo ! the eastern Cyclades, 
Phoenix-nests and sky-blue seas, 
— But I tarry not with these. 

Pass we drear New Holland's shoals, 
Where no ample river rolls, 
— World of unawaken'd souls ! 

Bring them forth ; — 'tis Heaven's decree. 

Man, assert thy hberty ; 

Let not brutes look down on thee. 

Either India next is seen, 

With the Ganges stretch'd between ; 

— Ah ! what horrors here have been. 

War, disguised as commerce, came ; 
Britain, carrying sword and flame. 
Won an empire, — lost her name. 

But that name shall be restored, 
Law and justice wield the sword, 
And her God be here adored. 

By the Gulf of Persia sail, 
Where the true-love nightingale 
Wooes the rose in every vale. 

Though Arabia charge the breeze 
With the incense of her trees, 
On I press through southern seas. 

Cape of storms, thy spectre fled, 

See, the angel Hope, instead, 

Lights from heaven upon thine head ; — 

And where Table-mountain stands. 
Barbarous hordes from desert sands 
Bless the sight with lifted hands. 

St. Helena's dungeon-keep 
Scowls defiance o'er the deep ; 
There a warrior's relics sleep. 



Who he was, and how he fell, 

Europe, Asia, Afric tell : •• 

On that theme all time shall dwell. 

But henceforth, till nature dies, 
These three simple words comprise 
All the future : " Here he hes." 

Mammon's plague-ships throng the waves : 
Oh ! 'twere mercy to the slaves. 
Were the maAvs of sharks their graves ! 

Not for all the gems and gold. 

Which thy streams and mountains hold. 

Or for which thy sons are sold, — 

Land of negroes ! would I dare 
In this felon-trade to share. 
Or to brand its guilt forbear. 

Hercules ! thy pillars stand. 
Sentinels of sea and land ! 
Cloud-capt Atlas towers at hand. 

Where, when Cato's word was fate, 
Fell the Carthaginian state. 
And where exiled Marius sate, — 

Mark the dens of caitiff Moors ; 
Ha ! the pirates seize their oars ; 
— Haste we from th' accursed shores. 

Egypt's hieroglyphic realm 

Other floods than Nile's o'erwhelm, 

— Slaves turn'd despots hold the helm, 

Judah's cities are forlorn, 
Lebanon and Carmel shorn, 
Zion trampled down with scorn. 

Greece, thine ancient lamp is spent ; 
Thou art thine own monument ; 
But the sepulchre is rent, — 




And a wind is on the wing, 

At whose breath neAv heroes spring, 

Sages teach, and poets sing. 

Italy, thy beauties shroud 
In a gorgeous evening cloud ; 
Thy refulgent head is bow'd. 

Rome, in ruins lovely still. 

On her capitolian hill, 

Bids thee, mourner, weep thy fill. 

Yet where Roman genius reigns, 
Roman blood must warm the veins ; 
— Look well, tyrants, to your chains. 

Splendid realm of old romance, 

Spain, thy tower-crown'd crest advance. 

Grasp the shield, and couch the lance. 

At the fire-flash of thine eye. 
Giant bigotry would fly. 
At thy voice oppression die. 

Lusitania, from the dust, 

Shake thy locks, — thy cause is just, 

Strike for freedom, strike and trust. 

France, I hurry from thy shore. 
Thou art not the France of yore. 
Thou art new-born France no more. 

Great thou wast ; and who like thee ? 
Then mad-drunk with liberty ; 
What noiv ? — neither great nor free. 

Sweep by Holland like the blast, 
One quick glance on Denmark cast, 
Sweden, Russia,— all are past. 

Elbe nor Weser tempt my stay ; 

Germany, beware the day. 

When thy schools again bear sway. 



Now to thee, to thee I fly, 
Fairest isle beneath the sky, 
To my heart, as in mine eye. 

I have seen them, one by one, 
Every shore beneath the sun. 
And my voyage now is done. 

While I bid them all be blest, 
Britain is my home, my rest ; 
— Mine own land ! I love thee best. 

Scarborough, December, 1826. 



HUMILITY. 



The bird that soars on highest wing, 
Builds on the ground her lowly nest ; 

And she that doth most sweetly sing. 
Sings in the shade when all things rest : 

— In lark and nightingale we see 

What honour hath humility. 

When Mary chose the " better part," 

She meekly sat at Jesus' feet ; 
And Lydia's gently-open'd heart 

Was made for God's own temple meet ; 
— Fairest and best adorn'd is she. 
Whose clothing is humility. 

The saint that wears heaven's brightest crown. 

In deepest adoration bends ; 
The weight of glory bows him down, 

Then most when most his soul ascends ; 
— Nearest the throne itself must be 
The footstool of humihty. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



BIRDS. 



THE SWALLOW. 



Swallow, why homeward turn'd thy joyful wing ? 

— In a far land I heard the voice of spring ; 

I found myself that moment on the way ; 

My wings, my wings, they had not power to stay. 

SKYLARKS. 

What hand lets fly the skylark from his rest? 
— That which detains his mate upon the nest ; 
Love sends him soaring to the fields above ; 
She broods below, all bound with cords of love. 

THE CUCKOO. 

Why art thou always welcome, lonely bird ? 

— The heart grows young again when I am heard ; 

Nor in my double note the magic lies. 

But in the fields, the woods, the streams, and skies. 

THE RED-BREAST. 

Familiar warbler, wherefore art thou come ? 
— To sing to thee, when all beside are dumb ; 
Pray let thy little children drop a crumb. 

THE SPARROW. 

Sparrow, the gun is levell'd, quit that wall. 
— Without the will of heaven I cannot fall. 

THE RING-DOVE. 

Art thou the bird that saw the waters cease ? 
— Yes, and brought home the olive-leaf of peace ; 
Henceforth I haunt the woods of thickest green, 
Pleased to be often heard, but seldom seen. 



THE NIGHTINGALE. 

Minstrel, what makes thy song so sad, so sweet ? 
— Love, love ; — there agony and rapture meet ; 
O 'tis the dream of happiness, to feign 
Sorrow in joy, and wring dehght from pain ! 

THE WATER-WAGTAIL. 

What art thou made of, — air, or light, or dew * 
— I have no time to tell you, if I knew ; 
My tail, — ask that, — perhaps may solve the matter : 
I've miss'd three flies already by this chatter. 

THE WREN. 

Wren, canst thou squeeze into a hole so small ? 
— Ay, with nine neslhngs too, and room for all ; 
Go, compass sea and land in search of bliss, 
Then tell me if you find a happier home than this. 

THE THRUSH. 

Thrush, thrush, have mercy on thy little bill. 
— " I play to please myself, albeit ill ;"* 
And yet, but how it. comes I cannot tell, 
My singing pleases all the world as well. 

THE BLACKBIRD, 

Well done ! — they're noble notes, distinct and strong ; 

Yet more variety might mend the song. 

— Is there another bird that chants like me ? 

My pipe gives all the grove variety. 

THE BULLFINCH. 

Bully, what fairy warbles in thy throat ? 
— Oh ! — for the freedom of my own wild note ! 
Art has enlhrall'd my voice ; I strive in vain 
To break the "linked sweetness" of my chain; 
Love, joy, rage, grief, ring one melodious strain. 



* Spenser's Shepherd's Calendar. June. 
33* 




THE GOLDFINCH. 

Live with me, love me, pretty goldfinch, do ! 
— Ay, pretty maid, and be a slave to you ; 
Wear chains, fire squibs, draw water, — nay, not I, 
While I've a bill to peck, or wing to fly. 

THE STONE-CHAT. 

Why art thou ever flitting to and fro ? 

— Plunge through these whins, their thorns will let thee 

know. 
There are five secrets brooding here in night, 
Which my good mate will duly bring to light ; 
Meanwhile she sees the ants around her throng. 
And hears the grasshopper chirp all day long. 

THE GRAY LINNET. 

Linnet, canst thou not change that humble coat ? 
Linnet, canst thou not mellow that sharp note ? 
— If rude my song, and mean my garb appear, 
Have you, sir, eyes to see, or ears to hear ? 

THE RED LINNET. 

Sweet is thy warble, beautiful thy plume ! 
— Catch me and cage me, then behold my doom ; 
My throat will fail, my colour wane away, 
And the red linnet soon become a gray.* 

THE CHAFFINCH. 

Stand still a moment ! 

— Spare your idle words, 
I'm the perpetual mobile of birds ; 
My days are running, rippling, twittering streams, 
When fast asleep I'm all afloat in dreams. 

THE CANARY. 

Dost thou not languish for thy father-land, 
Madeira's fragrant woods and billowy strand ? 

♦ Some naturalists say that this actually happens. 



— My cage is father-land enough for me ; 

Your parlour all the world, — heaven, earth, and sea. 

THE TOMTIT. 

Least, nimblest, merriest bird of Albion's isle, 
I cannot look on thee without a smile. 
— I envy thee the sight, for all my glee 
Could never yet extort a smile from me ; 
Think what a tiresome thing my life must be. 

THE SWIFT. 

Why ever on the wing, or perch'd elate ? 
— Because I fell not from my first estate ; 
This is my charter for the boundless skies, 
" Stoop not to earth, on pain no more to rise." 

THE KING-FISHER. 

Why dost thou hide thy beauty from the sun ? 
— The eye of man, but not of Heaven, I shun ; 
Beneath the mossy bank, with alders crown'd, 
I build and brood where running waters sound ; 
There, there the halcyon peace may still be found. 

THE WOODLARK. 

Thy notes are silenced, and thy plumage mew'd ; 
Say, drooping minstrel, both shall be renew'd. 
— Voice will return, — I cannot choose but sing; 
Yet liberty alone can plume my wing ; 
Oh ! give me that I — I will not, cannot fly 
Within a cage less ample than the sky ; 
Then shalt thou hear, as if an angel sung. 
Unseen in air, heaven's music from my tongue : 
Oh ! give me that I — I cannot rest at ease 
On meaner perches than the forest trees ; 
There, in thy walk, while evening shadows roll. 
My song shall melt into thine inmost soul : 
But, till thou let thy captive bird depart. 
The sweetness of my strain shall wring thy heart. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



THE COCK. 

Who taught thee, chanticleer, to count the clock? 
— Nay, who taught man that lesson but the cock ! 
Long before wheels and bells had learn'd to chime, 
I told the steps unseen, unheard, of time. 

THE JACK-DAW. 

Canst thou remember that unlucky day, 

When all thy peacock-plumes were pluck'd away ? 

— Remember it ? — believe me that I can. 

With right good cause, for I was then a man ! 

And for my folly, by a wise old law, 

Stript, whipt, tarr'd, feather'd, turn'd into a daw : 

— Pray, how d'ye hke my answer ? Caw, caw, caw I 



What shall I call thee, — bird, or beast, or neither ? 
— ^Just what you will ; I'm rather both than either; 
Much hke the season when I whirl my flight, 
The dusk of evening, — neither day nor night. 



Blue-eyed, strange-voiced, sharp-beak'd, ill-omen'd fowl, 
What art thou ? 

— What I ought to be, an owl ; 
But if I'm such a scarecrow in your eye, 
You're a much greater fright in mine ; — good-by ! 



What means that riot in your citadel ? 
Be honest, peaceable, like brethren dwell. 
— How, while we live so near to man, can hfe 
Be any thing but knavery, noise, and strife ? 

THE JAY. 

Thou hast a crested poll, a scutcheon'd wing, 

Fit for a herald of the eagle king, 

But such a voice ! I Avould that thou couldst sing ! 



— My bill has tougher work, — to scream for fright, 
And then, when screaming will not do, to bite. 

THE PEACOCK. 

Peacock ! of idle beauty, why so vain ? 

— And art thoii humble, who hast no proud train ? 

It is not vanity, but nature's part, 

To show, by me, the cunning of her art. 

THE SWAN. 

Sing me, fair swan, that song which poets dream. 
— Stand thou an hundred years beside this stream, 
Then may'st thou hear, perchance, my latest breath 
" Create a soul beneath the ribs of death."* 

THE PHEASANT. 

Pheasant, forsake the country, come to town ; 
I'll warrant thee a place beneath the crovra.. 
— No ; not to roost upon the throne, would I 
Renounce the woods, the mountains, and the sky. 

THE RAVEN. 

Thin is thy plumage, death is in thy croak ; 
Raven, come down from that majestic oak. 
— When I was hatch'd, my father set this tree, 
An acorn ; and its fall I hope to see, 
A century after thou hast ceased to be. 

THE PARROT. 

Camest thou from India, popinjay, — and why ? 
— To make thy children open ear and eye, 
Gaze on my feathers, wonder at my talk, 
And think 'tis almost time for Poll to walk. 

THE MAGPIE. 

Magpie, thou too hast learn'd by rote to speak 
Words without meaning, through thy uncouth beak. 

* Milton's Coinus. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



— Words have I leam'd ? and without meaning too ? 
No wonder, sir, for I was taught by you. 

THE CORN-CRAKE. 

Art thou a sound, and nothing but a sound ? 
' — Go round the field, and round the field, and round. 
You'll find my voice for ever changing ground ; 
And while your ear pursues my creaking cry. 
You look as if you heard it with your eye. 

THE STORK. 

Stork, why were human virtues given to thee ? 
— That human beings might resemble me ; 
Kind to my offspring, to my partner true. 
And duteous to my parents, — what are you ? 

THE WOODPECKER. 

Rap, rap, rap, rap, I hear thy knocking bill, 
Then thy strange outcry, when the woods are stilK 
— Thus am I ever labouring for my bread. 
And thus give thanks to find my table spread. 

THE HAWK. 

A life at every meal, rapacious hawk ! 
Spare helpless innocence ! 

— Troth, pleasant talk ! 
Yon swallow snaps more lives up in a day 
Than in a twelvemonth I could take away. 
But hark, most gentle censor, in your ear, 
A word, a whisper, — you — are you quite clear ? 
Creation's groans, through ocean, earth, and sky, 
Ascend from all that walk, or swim, or fly. 

VULTURES. 

Abominable harpies, spare the dead. 
— We only clear the field which man has spread ; 
On which should Heaven its hottest vengeance rain ? 
You slay the living, we but strip the slain. 



THE HUMMING BIRD. 



Art thou a bird, or bee, or butterfly ? 
— Each and all three. — A bird in shape am I, 
A bee collecting sweets from bloom to bloom, 
A butterfly in brilliancy of plume. 



THE EAGLE. 



Art thou the king of birds, proud eagle, say ? 
— I am ; my talons and my beak bear sway ; 
A greater king than I, if thou wouldst be. 
Govern thy tongue, but let thy thoughts be free. 



THE PELICAN. 



Bird of the wilderness, what is thy name ? 
— The pelican !- — go, take the trump of fame, 
And if thou give the honour due to me. 
The world may talk a little more of thee. 



THE HERON. 

Stock-still upon that stone, from day to day, 

I see thee watch the river for thy prey. 

— ^Yes, I'm the tyrant here ; but when I rise. 

The well-train'd ifalcon braves me in the skies ; 

Then comes the tug of war, of strength and skill. 

He dies, impaled on my updarted bill, 

Or, powerless in his grasp, my doom I meet, 

Dropt as a trophy at his master's feet. 

THE BIRD OF PARADISE. 

The bird of paradise ! 

— That name I bear, 
Though I am nothing but a bird of air : 
Thou art a child of earth, and yet to thee. 
Lost and recover'd, paradise is free : 
Oh ! that such glory were reserved for me ! 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



THE OSTRICH. 

Hast thou expell'd the mother from thy breast, 
And to the desert's mercies left thy nest ? 
— Ah ! no, the mother in me knows her part ; 
Yon glorious sun is warmer than my heart ; 
And when to light he brings my hungry brood, 
He spreads for them the wilderness with food. 



THE GENTIANELLA. 



Green thou art, obscurely green, 
Meanest plant among the mean ! 

From the dust I took my birth ; 
Thou, too, art a child of earth ; 
/ aspire not to be great ; 
Scorn not thou my low estate ; 
Time will come when thou shalt see 
Honour crown humihty, 
Beauty set her seal on me. 

IN FLOWER. 

Blue thou art, intensely blue. 

Flower, whence came thy dazzling hue ? 

When I open'd first mine eye. 
Upward glancing to the sky. 
Straightway from the firmament 
Was the sapphire brilliance sent. 
Brighter glory wouldst thov. share, 
Do what I did, — look up there; 
What I could not, — look with prayer ! 



A LUCID INTERVAL. 



A LUCID INTERVAL. 

Oh ! light is pleasant to the eye, 

And health comes rustling on the gale ; 

Clouds are careering through the sky, 

Whose shadows mock them down the dale ; 

Nature as fresh and fragrant seems 

As I have met her in my dreams. 

For I have been a prisoner long 
In gloom and loneliness of mind ; 

Deaf to the melody of song, 
To every form of beauty blind ; 

Nor morning dew, nor evening balm, 

Might cool my cheek, my bosom calm. 

But now the blood, the blood returns 

With rapturous pulses through my veins ; 

My heart from out its ashes burns ; 

My limbs break loose, they cast their chains ; 

New kindled at the sun, my sight 

Tracks to a point the eagle's flight. 

I long to chmb those old gray rocks, 
Glide with yon river to the deep. 

Range the green hills with herds and flocks, 
Free as the roebuck run and leap ; 

Or mount the lark's victorious wing, 

And from the depth of ether sing. 

O earth ! in maiden innocence. 

Too early fled thy golden time ; 
O earth ! earth ! earth ! for man's offence, 

Doom'd to dishonour in thy prime ; 
Of how much glory then bereft ! 
Yet what a world of bliss is left ! 

The thorn, harsh emblem of the curse, 
Puts forth a paradise of flowers ; 



Labour, man's punishment, is nurse 
To home-born joys at sunset hour ; 
Plague, earthquake, famine, want, disease, 
Give birth to hohest charities. 

And death itself, with all the woes 
That hasten, yet prolong his stroke, 

Death brings with every pang repose, 
With every sigh he solves a yoke ; 

Yea, his cold sweats and moaning strife 

Wring out the bitterness of hfe. 

Life, life with all its burdens dear ! 

Friendship is sweet, love sweeter still ; 
Who would forego a smile, a tear. 

One generous hope, one chastening ill ? 
Home, kindred, country, — these are ties 
Might keep an angel from the skies. 

But these have angels never known ; 

Unvex'd felicity their lot ; 
The sea of glass before the throne, 

Storm, hghtning, shipAvreck, visit not ; 
Our tides, beneath the changing moon, 
Are soon appeased, are troubled soon. 

Well, I would bear what all have borne, 
Live my few years, and fill my place, 

O'er old and young affections mourn, 
Rent one by one from my embrace. 

Till suffering ends, and I have done 

With every thing beneath the sun. 

Whence came I ? — Memory cannot say ; 

What am I ? — Knowledge will not show ; 
Bound whither ? — Ah ! away, away, 

Far as eternity can go : — 
Thy love to win, thy wrath to flee, 
O God ! thyself my teacher be. 

1823. 



WORMS AND FLOWERS. 



WORMS AND FLOWERS. 

You're spinning for my lady, worm ! 

Silk garments for the fair ; 
You're spinning rainbows for a form 

More beautiful than air, 
When air is bright with sunbeams. 

And morning mists arise 
From woody vales and mountain streams, 

To blue autumnal skies. 

You're spinning for my lady, flower ! 

You're training for my love. 
The glory of her summer-bower, 

While skylarks soar above : 
Go, twine her locks with rose-buds. 

Or breathe upon her breast, 
While zephyrs curl the water-floods 

And rock the halcyon's nest. 

But oh ! there is another worm 

Ere long will visit her, 
And revel on her lovely form. 

In the dark sepulchre : 
Yet from that sepulchre shall spring 

A flower as sweet as this ; 
Hard by the nightingale shall sing, 

Soft winds its petals kiss. 

Frail emblems of frail beauty, ye ! 

In beauty who would trust? 
Since all that charms the eye must be 

Consign'd to worms and dust : 
Yet like the flower that decks her tomb, 

Her spirit shall quit the sod, 
To shine in amaranthine bloom. 

Fast by the throne of God. 

1834. 



THE RECLUSE. 

A FOUNTAIN issuing into light, 

Before a marble palace, threw 
To heaven its column, pure and bright. 

Returning thence in showers of dew ; 
But soon an humbler course it took. 
And ghd aAvay a nameless brook. 

Flowers on its grassy margin sprang, 
Fhes o'er its eddying surface play'd. 

Birds midst the alder-branches sang. 

Flocks through the verdant meadows stray'd , 

The weary there lay down to rest, 

And there the halcyon built her nest. 

'Twas beautiful, to stand and watch 
The fountain's crystal turn to gems. 

And from the sky such colours catch. 
As if 'twere raining diadems ; 

Yet all was cold and curious art. 

That charm'd the eye, but miss'd the heart. 

Dearer to me the little stream, 
Whose unimprison'd waters run. 

Wild as the changes of a dream. 

By rock and glen, through shade and sun ; 

Its lovely links had power to bind 

In welcome chains my wandering mind. 

So thought I, when I saw the face 

By happy portraiture reveal'd. 
Of one, adorn'd with every grace, 

— Her name and date from me conceal'd. 
But not her story ; — she had been 
The pride of many a splendid scene. 



I 



She cast her glory round a court, 
And frolick'd in the gayest ring, 

Where fashion's high-born minions sport, 
Lilce sparkhng fire-flies on the wing ; 

But thence, when love had touch'd her soul, 

To nature and to truth she stole. 

From din, and pageantry, and strife, 

Midst woods and mountains, vales and plains, 

She treads the paths of lowly hfe. 
Yet in a bosom-circle reigns, 

No fountain scattering diamond showers. 

But the sweet streamlet watering flowers. 

1829. 



TIME: 



A RHAPSODY. 



Sed fugit, interea, fugit irreparabile tempus. 

ViRO. Georg. iii. 284. 

'Tis a mistake : time flies not, 

He only hovers on the wing : 
Once born, the moment dies not, 

'Tis an immortal thing ; 
While all is change beneath the sky, 
Fix'd like the sun, as learned sages prove, 
Though from our moving world he seems to move, 
'Tis time stands still, and we that fly. 

There is no past ; from nature's birth. 
Days, months, years, ages, till the end 

Of these revolving heavens and earth, 
All to one centre tend ; 

And, having reach'd it late or soon, 
Converge, — as in a lens, the rays, 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



Caught from the fountain-light of noon, 
Blend in a point that blinds the gaze : 
— What has been is, what is shall last ; 
The present is the focus of the past ; 
The future, perishing as it arrives, 
Becomes the present, and itself survives. 

Time is not progress, but amount; 

One vast accumulating store. 
Laid up, not lost ; — we do not count 

Years gone but added to the score 
Of wealth untold, to clime nor class confined. 
Riches to generations lent. 
For ever spending, never spent, 
Th' august inheritance of all mankind. 
Of this, from Adam to his latest heir, 
All in due turn their portion share, 
Which, as they husband or abuse, j 

Their souls they win or lose. 

Though history, on her faded scrolls. 
Fragments of facts, and wrecks of names enrols. 
Time's indefatigable fingers write 
Men's meanest actions on their souls, 
In lines which not himself can blot : 

These the last day shall bring to light, 
Though through long centuries forgot. 

When hearts and sepulchres are bared to sight. 

Then, having fill'd his measure up, 

Amidst his own assembled progeny, 

(All that have been, that are, or yet may be,) 

Before the great white throne, 

To Him who sits thereon, 

Time shall present th' amalgamating cup, 

In which, as in a crucible. 

He hid the moments as they fell. 

More precious than Golconda's gems, 

Or stars in angels' diadems. 



TO A FRIEND. 



Though to our eyes they seem'd to pass 

Like sands through his symbolic glass : 

But now, the process done, 

Of millions multiplied by millions, none 

Shall there be wanting, — while by change 

Ineffiible and strange, 

All shall appear at once, all shall appear as one. 

Ah ! then shall each of Adam's race, 

In that concenter'd instant, trace, 

Upon the tablet of his mind, 

His whole existence in a thought combined, 

Thenceforth to part no more, but be 

Impictured on his memory ; 

— As in the image-chamber of the eye. 

Seen at a glance, in clear perspective. He 

Myriads of forms of ocean, earth, and sky. 

Then shall be shown, that but in name 
Time and eternity were both the same ; 
A point which life nor death could sever, 
A moment standinor still for ever. 



TO A FRIEND, 

WITH A COPY OF THE FOREGOING LUCUBRATION. 

May she for whom these hnes are penn'd, 
By using well, make time her friend ; 
Then, whether he stands still or flies. 
Whether the moment lives or dies. 
She need not care, — for time will be 
Her friend to all eternity. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



THE RETREAT. 

Written on finding a copy of verses in a small edifice so named, at Raithby, in 
Lincolnshire, the seat of R. C. Brackenbnry, to whom the author made a visit 
in the autumn of 1815, after a severe illness. 

A STRANGER sat down in the lonely retreat ; — 

Though kindness had welcomed him there, 
Yet weary with travel, and fainting with heat. 

His bosom was sadden'd with care : 
That sinking of spirit they only can know, 

Whose joys are all chasten'd with fears ; 
Whose waters of comfort, though deeply they flow, 

Still wind through the valley of tears. 

What ails thee, O stranger ! but open thine eye, 

A paradise bursts on thy view ; 
The sun in full glory is marching on high 

Through cloudless and infinite blue : 
The woods, in their wildest luxuriance display'd, 

Are stretching their coverts of green. 
While bright from the depth of their innermost shade, 

Yon mirror of waters is seen. 

There richly reflected, the mansion, the lawn. 

The banks and the foliage appear, 
By nature's own pencil enchantingly drawn, 

— A landscape enshrined in a sphere ; 
While the fish in their element sport to and fro, 

Q,uick glancing or ghding at ease. 
The birds seem to fly in a concave below, 

Through a vista of down-growing trees. 

The current, unrippled by volatile airs. 

Now glitters, now darkens along, 
And yonder o'erflowing, incessantly bears 

Symphonious accordance to song : 



THE RETREAT. 



— The song of the ring-dove enamour'd, that floats 

Like soft-melting murmurs of grief; 
— The song of the red-breast, in ominous notes, 

Foretelling the fall of the leaf: 

— The song of the bee, in its serpentine flight, 

From blossom to blossom that roves ; 
— The song of the wind, in the silence of night, 

When it wakens or hushes the groves : 
— Thus sweet in the chorus of rapture and love, 

Which God in his temple attends. 
With the song of all nature beneath and above. 

The voice of these waters ascends. 

The beauty, the music, the bliss of that scene, 

With ravishing sympathy stole 
Through the stranger's lorn bosom, illumined his mien, 

And soothed and exalted his soul : 
Cold, gloomy forebodings then vanish'd away. 

His terrors to ecstasies turn. 
As the vapours of night, at the dawning of day, 

With splendour and loveliness burn. 

The stranger reposed in the lonely retreat, 

Now smiling at phantoms gone by, 
When, lo ! a new welcome, in numbers most sweet, 

Saluted his ear through his eye : 
It came to his eye, but it went to his soul ; 

— Some muse, as she wander'd that way. 
Had dropt from her bosom a mystical scroll. 

Whose secrets I dare not betray. 

Strange tones, we are told, the pale mariner hears, 

When the mermaids ascend from their caves. 
And sing, where the moon's lengthen'd image appears 

A column of gold on the waves ; 
— And wild notes of wonder the shepherd entrance. 

Who dreaming beholds in the vale. 
By torchlight of glow-worms, the fairies that dance 

To minstrelsy piped in the gale. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



Not less to that stranger, mysteriously brought, 

With harmony deep and refined, 
In language of feeling and music of thought, 

Those numbers were heard in his mind : 
Then quick beat the pulse which had languidly crept, 

And sent through his veins a spring-tide ; 
It seem'd as the harp of a seraph were swept 

By a spirit that sung at his side. 

All ceased in a moment, and nothing was heard. 

And nothing was seen, through the wood, 
But the twittering cry of a fugitive bird. 

And the sunset that blazed on the flood : 
He rose, for the shadows of evening grew long, 

And narrow the glimpses between ; 
The owl in his ambush was Avhooping his song, 

And the gossamer glanced on the green. 

Oft pausing, and hearkening, and turning his eye, 

He left the sequester'd retreat ; 
As the stars in succession awoke through the sky. 

And the moon of the harvest shone sweet ; 
So pure was her lustre, so lovely and bright. 

So soft on the landscape it lay. 
The shadows appear'd but the slumber of light. 

And the night-scene a dream of the day. 

He walk'd to the mansion, — though silent his tongue, 

And his heart with its fulness opprest. 
His spirit within him melodiously sung 

The feelings that throbb'd in his breast : 
— " Oh ! ye, who inherit this privileged spot ! 

All blooming like Eden of yore, 
What earth can afford is already your lot. 

With the promise of ' Hfe evermore.' 

" Here, oft as to strangers your table is spread. 

May angels sit down at your board ; 
Here, oft as the poor by your bounty are fed. 

Be charity shown to your Lord ; 



Thus walking with God in your paradise here, 

In humble communion of love, 
At length may your spirits, when He shall appear, 

Be caught up to glory above." 



THE LILY. 

TO A jTOUNG lady, E. P. 

Flower of light, forget thy birth, 
Daughter of the sordid earth, 
Lift the beauty of thine eye 
To the blue ethereal sky ! 

While thy graceful buds unfold 
Silver petals starr'd with gold. 
Let the bee among thy bells 
Rifle their ambrosial cells, 
And the nimble-pinion'd air 
Waft thy breath to heaven like prayer. 
Cloud and sun alternate shed 
Gloom or glory round thine head ; 
Morn impearl thy leaves with dews. 
Evening lend them rosy hues. 
Noon with snow-white splendour bless, 
Night with glow-worm jewels dress. 
— Thus fulfil thy summer-day. 
Spring, and flourish, and decay ; 
Live a life of fragrance, — then 
Disappear, — to rise again. 
When thy sisters of the vale 
Welcome back the nightingale. 

So may she, whose name I write. 
Be herself a flower of light. 
Live a life of innocence. 
Die to be transplanted hence 
To that garden in the skies. 
Where the hly never dies. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



THE SKY-LARK. 
(addressed to a friend.) 

On hearing one singing at daybreak, during a sharp frost, on the 17th of Februa- 
ry, 1832, while the author was on travel, between Bath and Stroud. 

O WARN away the gloomy night, 
With music make the welkin ring. 
Bird of the dawn ! — On joyful wing, 

Soar through thine element of light, 

Till naught in heaven mine eye can see. 
Except the morning star and thee. 

O welcome in the cheerful day ! 

Through rosy clouds the shades retire. 
The sun hath touch'd thy plumes with fire, 

And girt thee with a golden ray : 

Now shape and voice are vanish'd quite, 
Nor eye nor ear can track thy flight. 

Could I translate thy strains, and give 
Words to thy notes in human tongue, 
The sweetest lay that e'er I sung, 

The lay that would the longest hve, 
I might record upon this page, 
And sing thy song from age to age. 

But speech of mine can ne'er reveal 

Secrets so freely told above, 

Yet is their burden joy and love. 
And all the bhss a bird can feel, 

Whose wing in heaven to earth is bound. 

Whose home and heart are on the ground. 

Unlike the lark be thou, my friend ! 

No do\vnward cares thy thoughts engage. 



But in thine house of pilgrimage, 
Though from the ground thy songs ascend, 
Still be their burden joy and love : 
— Heaven is thy home, thy heart above. 



THE FIXED STARS. 



J 



Reign in your heaven, ye stars of Hght ! 

Beyond this troubled scene ; 
With you, fair orbs ! there is no night, 

Eternally serene. 
Each casts around its tranquil way, 
The radiance of its own clear day ; 
Yet not unborrow'd. — What are ye ? 
Mirrors of Deity : 
My soul, in your reflective rays. 
Him whom no eye hath seen surveys. 
As I behold (himself too bright for view) 
The sun in every drop of dew. 

The gloom that brings, through evening skies. 

Your beauty from the deep ; 
The clouds that hide you from our eyes ; 

The storms that seem to sweep 
Your scatter'd train, like vessels tost 
On ocean's waves, now seen, now lost ; 
— Belong to our inferior ball, 
Ye shine above them all : 
Your splendour noon eclipses not, 
Nor night reveals, nor vapours blot ; 
O'er us, not you, these changes come and pass 
Ye navigate a sea of glass. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



Thus, on their hyahne above, 

In constellations stand 
The tribes redeem'd by sovereign love : 

— Crown'd and Avith harp in hand, 
They sing before the great I AM, 
The song of Moses and the Lamb ; 
Returning in perpetual streams 
His own all-lightening beams. 
Theirs be thy portion, O my soul ! 
That while heaven's years self-circling roll, 
I may, among the ransom'd — they in me. 
And I in them, — God's image see. 

1834. 



A CRY FROM SOUTH AFRICA ; 

On building a Chapel at Cape Town, for tlie Negro Slaves of the colony, in 1828. 

Afric, from her remotest strand, 

Lifts to high heaven one fetter'd hand. 

And to the utmost of her chain 

Stretches the other o'er the main : 

Then, kneeling 'midst ten thousand slaves. 

Utters a cry across the waves, 

Of power to reach to either pole, 

And pierce, hke conscience, through the soul. 

Though dreary, faint, and low the sound, 

Like life-blood gurgling from a wound. 

As if her heart, before it broke. 

Had found a human tongue, and spoke. 

" Britain ! not now I ask of thee 
Freedom, the right of bond and free ; 
Let Mammon hold, while Mammon can. 
The bones and blood of living man ; 
Let tyrants scorn, while tyrants dare. 
The shrieks and writhings of despair ; 



A CRY FROM SOUTH AFRICA. 



An end will come — it will not wait, 
Bands, yokes, and scourges have their date, 
Slavery itself must pass away, 
And be a tale of yesterday. 

But now 1 urge a dearer claim, 
And urge it by a mightier name : 
Hope of the world ! on thee I call, 
By the great Father of us all, 
By the Redeemer of our race, 
And by the Spirit of all grace. 
Turn not, Britannia, from my plea ; 
— So help thee God as thou help'st me ! 
Mine outcast children come to light 
From darkness, and go down in night ; 
— -A night of more mysterious gloom 
Than that which wrapt them in the womb : 
Oh ! that the womb had been the grave 
Of every being born a slave ! 
Oh ! that the grave itself might close 
The slave's unutterable woes ! 
But what beyond that gulf may be. 
What portion in eternity. 
For those who live to curse their breath, 
And die Avithout a hope in death, 
I know not, and I dare not think ; 
Yet, while I shudder o'er the brink 
Of that unfathomable deep, 
Where wrath Hes chain'd and judgments sleep. 
To thee, thou paradise of isles ! 
Where mercy in full glory smiles ; 
Eden of lands ! o'er all the rest 
By blessing others doubly blest, 
— To thee I lift my weeping eye ; 
Send me the Gospel or I die ; 
The word of Christ's salvation give, 
That I may hear his voice and hve. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



SPEED THE PROW. 

Not the ship that swiftest saileth, 

But which longest holds her way- 
Onward, onward, never faileth. 

Storm and calm, to win the day ; 
Earliest she the haven gains, 
Which the hardest stress sustains. 

O'er life's ocean, wide and pathless, 
Thus would I with patience steer ; 

No vain hope of journeying scathless. 
No proud boast to face down fear ; 

Dark or bright his Providence, 

Trust in God be my defence. 

Time there was, — 'tis so no longer, — 

When I crowded every sail, 
Battled with the waves, and stronger 

Grew, as stronger grew the gale ; 
But my strength sunk with the wind. 
And the sea lay dead behind. 

There my bark had founder'd surely, 

But a Power invisible 
Breathed upon me ; — then securely. 

Borne along the gradual swell, 
Helm, and shrouds, and heart renew'd, 
I my humbler course pursued. 

Now, though evening shadows blacken. 
And no star comes through the gloom, 

On I move, nor will I slacken 

Sail, though verging towards the tomb ; 

Bright beyond, — on heaven's high strand, 

Lo, the liofhthouse ! — land, land, land! 



THE CHOLERA MOUNT. «3 

Cloud and sunshine, wind and weather, 

Sense and sight are fleeing fast ; 
Time and tide must fail together, 

Life and death will soon be past ; 
But where day's last spark declines, 
Glory everlasting shines. 



THE CHOLERA MOUNT. 

LINES ON THE BURYING-PLACE FOR PATIENTS WHO DIED OF CHOLERA 
MORBUS ; A PLEASANT EMINENCE IN SHEFFIELD PARK. 

Written during the prevalence of the disease in 1832, and while great terror of 
infection from it was experienced throughout the Iiingdom, sanctioned by legis- 
lative authority, requiring the separate interment of its unfortunate victims. 

In death divided from their dearest kin. 
This is "a field to bury strangers in :" 
Fragments, from families untimely reft. 
Like spoils in flight, or hmbs in battle reft, 
Lie here ; — a sad community, whose bones 
Might feel, melhinks, a pang to quicken stones ; 
While from beneath my feet they seem to cry, 
" Oh ! is it naught to you, ye passers by ! 
When from its earthly house the spirit fled. 
Our dust might not be ' free among the dead V 
Ah ! Avhy were we to this Siberia sent, 
Doom'd in the grave itself to banishment ?" 

Shuddering humanity asks, " Who are these ? 
And what their crime ?" — They fell by one disease! 
By the blue pest, whose gripe no art can shun. 
No force unwrench, out-singled one by one ; 
When, like a monstrous birth, the womb of fate 
Bore a new death of unrecorded date, 
And doubtful name. — Far east the fiend begun 
Its course ; thence round the world pursued the sun, 



The ghosts of millions following at its hack, 
Whose desecrated graves hetray'd tlieir track. 
On Albion's shores unseen the invader stept ; 
Secret and swift through field and city swept ; 
At noon, at midnight, seized the weak, the strong. 
Asleep, awake, alone, amid the throng ; 
Kill'd hke a murderer ; fix'd its icy hold. 
And wrung out hfe with agony of cold ; 
Nor stay'd its vengeance where it crush'd the prey. 
But set a mark, like Cain's, upon their clay, 
And this tremendous seal impress'd on all, 
"Bury me out of sight and out of call." 

Wherefore no filial foot this turf may tread. 
No kneeling mother kiss her baby's bed ; 
No maiden unespoused, with widow'd sighs. 
Seek her soul's treasure where her true love Hes : 
— All stand aloof, and eye this mount from far, 
As panic-stricken crowds some baleful star. 
Strange to the heavens, that, with bewilder'd light. 
Like a lost spirit wanders through the night. 

Yet many a mourner weeps her fallen state, 
In many a home by these left desolate. 
Once warm with love, and radiant with the smiles 
Of woman, watching infants at their wiles, 
Whose eye of thought, when now they throng her knees, 
Pictures far other scene than that she sees. 
For one is wanting, — one, for whose dear sake, 
Her heart for very tenderness would ache, 
As now with anguish, — doubled when she spies 
In this his lineaments, in that his eyes, 
In each his image with her own commix'd. 
And there, at least, through hfe their union fix'd. 

Humanity again asks, " Who are these ? 
And what their crime ?" — They fell by one disease ; 
Not by the Proteus-maladies that strike 
Man into nothingness, not twice ahke ; 
But when they knock'd for entrance at the tomb. 
Their fathers' bones refused to make them room ; 



THE CHOLERA MOUNT. 



Recoiling Nature from their presence fled, 

As though a thunderbolt had smote them dead ; 

Their cries pursued her with the thrilling plea, 

"Give us a little earth for charity !" 

She linger'd, hsten'd, all her bosom yearn'd, 

Through every vein the mother's pulse return'd ; 

Then, as she halted on this hill, she threw 

Her mantle wide, and loose her tresses flew : 

"Live !" to the slain, she cried, "My children, live ! 

This for an heritage to you I give ; 

Had death consumed you by the common lot, 

You with the multitude had been forgot. 

Now through an age of ages shall ye not." 

Thus Nature spake, and as her echo, I 
Take up her parable, and prophesy : 
— Here, as from spring to spring the swallows pass. 
Perennial daisies shall adorn the grass ; 
Here the shrill sky-lark build her annual nest, 
And sing in heaven while j'ou serenely rest : 
On trembling dew-drops morn's first glance shall shine, 
Eve's latest beams on this fair bank decline, 
And oft the rainbow steal through light and gloom. 
To throw its sudden arch across your tomb ; 
On you the moon her sweetest influence shower. 
And every planet bless you in its hour. 

With statelier honours still, in time's slow round. 
Shall this sepulchral eminence be crown'd. 
Where generations long to come shall hail 
The growth of centuries waving in the gale, 
A forest landmark on the mountain's head. 
Standing betwixt the living and the dead ; 
Nor while your language lasts, shall traveller cease 
To say, at sight of your memorial, " Peace.'" 
Your voice of silence answering from the sod, 
" Whoe'er thou art, prepare to meet thy GodJ"^ 

1832. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



TO MARY. 

Mary ! — it is a lovely name, 

Thrice honour'd in the rolls of fame, 

Not for the blazonry of birth. 

Nor honours springing from the earth, 

But what evangelists have told. 

Of three, who bare that name of old : 

— Mary, the mother of our Lord, 

Mary, who sat to hear his word, 

And Mary Magdalen, to whom 

Christ came, while weeping o'er his tomb 

These to that humble name supply 

A glory which can never die. 

JMary ! my prayer for you shall be, 
— May you resemble all the three 
In faith, and hope, and charity. 



SHORT-HAND. 

STANZAS ADDRESSED TO E. P. 

These lines and dots are locks and keys, 
In narrow space to treasure thought. 

Whose precious hoards, whene'er you please, 
Are thus to hght from darkness brought. 

On the small tablet of your heart. 

By heaven's own finger be engraved, 

Within, without, through every part. 

The "words whereby you must be saved." 

There the bright pages of God's book. 

In secret characters may lie. 
Where you alone have power to look. 

While hid from man and angel's eye. 



TO GEORGE BENNET, ESQ. 



Could nature's mysteries all be found, 
Unbosom'd, Avhere the billows roll, 

In flowers embroider'd o'er the ground, 
By stars emblazon'd round the pole ; — 

Less were the sum of truth reveal'd. 

Through heaven, and earth, and sea express'd, 
Than would be written, sign'd, and seal'd, 

Once and for ever, in your breast. 



TO MY FRIEND, 

GEORGE BENNET, ESQ., 

OF SHEFFIELD, 

On his intended visit to Tahiti, and other Islands of the South Sea, where 
Christianity had been recently established. 

Go, take the wings of morn, 

And fly beyond the utmost sea ; 
Thou shah not feel thyself forlorn, 

Thy God is still with thee ; 
And where his Spirit bids thee dwell, 
There, and there only, thou art Vv-ell. 

Forsake thy father-land, 

Kindred, and friends, and pleasant home ; 
O'er many a rude, barbarian strand, 

In exile though thou roam, 
Walk there with God, and thou shalt find 
Double for all thy faith resign'd. 

Launch boldly on the surge, 

And in a light and fragile bark, 
Thy path through flood and tempest urge, 

Like Noah in the ark, 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



Then tread like him a new world's shore, 
Thine altar build, and God adore. 

Leave our Jerusalem, 

Jehovah's temple and his rest ; 
Go where no Sabbath rose on them. 

Whom pagan gloom oppress'd, 
Till bright, though late, around their isles. 
The Gospel-dawn awoke in smiles. 

Amidst that dawn, from far. 

Be thine expected presence shown ; 

Rise on them like the morning star 
In glory not thine own, 

And tell them, while they hail the sight, 

TVho turn'd thy darkness into Hght. 

Point where his hovering rays 
Already gild their ocean's brim. 

Erelong o'er heaven and earth to blaze ; 
Direct all eyes to Him, 

—The sun of righteousness, who brings 

Mercy and healing on his wings. 

Nor thou disdain to teach 

To savage hordes celestial truth. 

To infant-tongues thy mother's speech. 
Ennobling arts to youth. 

Till warriors fling their arms aside. 

O'er bloodless fields the plough to guide. 

Train them, by patient toil, 

To rule the waves, subdue the ground. 
Enrich themselves with nature's spoil, 

With harvest-trophies crown'd, 
Till coral-reefs, midst desert seas. 
Become the new Hesperides. 

Thus then in peace depart. 

And angels guide thy footsteps : — No ! 



TO GEORGE BENNET, ESQ. 



There is a feeling in the heart, 

That will not let thee go : 
Yet go, — thy spirit stays with me ; 
Yet go, — my spirit goes with thee. 

Though the broad world, between 
Our feet, conglobe its solid mass ; 

Though lands and oceans intervene, 
Which I must never pass ; 

Though day and night to thee be changed, 

Seasons reversed, and chmes estranged ; 

Yet one in soul, — and one 

In faith, and hope, and purpose yet, 
God's witness in the heavens, yon sun, 

Forbid thee to forget 
Those from whose eyes his orb retires, 
When thine his morning beauty fires ! 
When tropic gloom returns, 

Mark what new stars their vigils keep. 
How glares the Avolf, — the phoenix burns. 

And on a stormless deep. 
The ship of heaven, — the patriarch's dove. 
The emblem of redeeming love.* 

While these enchant thine eye. 

Oh ! think how often we have walk'd. 

Gazed on the glories of our sky, 
Of higher glories talk'd. 

Till our hearts caught a kindling ray. 

And burn'd within us by the way. 

Those hours, those walks are past. 

We part ; — and ne'er again may meet : 

Why are the joys that will not last 
So perishingly sweet ? 

Farewell, — we surely meet again 

In life or death ; — farewell till then. 

Sheffield, March 10, 1821. 
• The cross, the dove, tlie phoenix, the wolf, are southern constellations. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



ONE WARNING MORE. 

WRITTEN FOR DISTRIBUTION ON A RACE COURSE, 1824. 

One fervent, faithful warning more 
To him who heeded none before. 

The fly around the candle wheels, 

Enjoys the sport, and gaily sings, 
Till nearer, nearer borne, he feels 

The flame like lightning singe his wings ; 
Then weltering in the gulf below he lies. 
And limb by limb, scorch'd miserably, dies. 

From bough to bough the wild bird hops. 
Where late he caroU'd blithe and free. 

But downward, downward, now he drops. 
Faint, fluttering, helpless from the tree. 

Where, stretch'd below, with eye of deadly ray. 

The eager rattle-snake expects his prey. 

Thou, child of pleasure, art the fly. 

Drawn by the taper's dazzling glare ; 
Thou art the bird that meets an eye. 

Alluring to the serpent's snare ; 
Oh ! stay : — is reason lost ? — is conscience dumb ? 
Be wise, be warn'd, escape the wrath to come. 
Not swifter o'er the level course. 

The racer glances to the goal, 
Than thou, with blind and headlong force 

Art running on — to lose thy soul ; 
Then, though the Avorld were won, how dear the cost ! 
Can the whole world avail a spirit lost ? 

Death, on his pale horse, following fast. 
Gains on thy speed, — with hell behind ; 

Fool ! all thy yesterdays are past. 
To-morrow thou Avilt never find ; 

To-day is hastening to eternity ; 

" This night thy soul shall be required of thee." 



A RIDDLE. 



A RIDDLE. 

ADDRESSED TO E. E., 1820. 



I KNOW not who these lines may see ; 
I know not what these lines will be ; 
But, since a word in season sent, 
As from a bow at hazard bent, 
May reach a roving eye, or dart 
Conviction to a careless heart. 
Oh ! that an arrow I could find 
In the small quiver of my mind. 
Which, with unerring aim, should strike 
Each, Avho encounters it, alike ! 

Reader ! attention ! — I will spring 
A wondrous thought ; 'tis on the wing ; 
Guard well your heart, you guard in vain, 
The wound is made, yet gives no pain ; 
Surprise may make your cheek to glow, 
But, courage ! none but you can know ; 
The thought, awaken'd by my spell, 
Is more than I myself can tell. 
How ? — search the chamber of your breast, 
And think of that ivhich you love best J 
I've raised the spirit, but cannot lay it. 
Your secret found, but can't betray it. 
So, ask yourself, — " What will this be, 
A thousand ages hence, to me ?" 
And if it will not stand the fire, 
In which all nature shall expire, 
Think, — ere these rhymes aside are cast, — 
As though the thought might be your last, 
" Where shall I find below, above. 
An object worthy of my love ?" 

Now hearken, and forget it never, — 
Love that which you may love for ever. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS, 



THE TOMBS OF THE FATHERS. 

The Jews occasionally hold a " Solemn Assembly" in the valley of Jehoshaphat, 
the ancient burial-place of Jerusalem. They are obliged to pay a heavy tax for 
the privilege of thus mourning, in stillness, at the sepulchres of their ancestors. 

Part I. 

In Babylon they sat and wept, 

Down by the river's willowy side ; 
And when the breeze their harp-strings swept, 

The strings of breaking hearts replied : 

— A deeper sorrow now they hide ; 
No Cyrus comes to set them free 
From ages of captivity. 

All lands are Babylons to them, 

Exiles and fugitives they roam ; 
What is their own Jerusalem ? 

— The place where they are least at home ! 

Yet hither from all climes they come ; 
And pay their gold, for leave to shed 
Tears o'er the generations fled. 

Around, the eternal mountains stand. 
With Hinnom's darkling vale between ; 

Old Jordan wanders through the land. 
Blue Carmel's sea-ward crest is seen, 
And Lebanon yet sternly green 

Throws, when the evening sun decHnes, 

Its cedar-shades, in lengthening lines. 

But, ah ! for ever vanish'd hence. 
The temple of the living God, 

Once Zion's glory and defence ! 

— Now mourn beneath the oppressor's rod, 
The fields which faithful Abraham trod, 

Where Isaac walk'd by twilight gleam. 

And heaven came down on Jacob's dream. 



THE TOMBS OF THE FATHERS. 



For eA'er mingled Avith the soil, 

Those armies of the Lord of Hosts, 

That conquer'd Canaan, shared the spoil, 

duell'd Moab's pride, slorm'd Midian's posts, 
Spread paleness through Philistia's coasts, 

And taught the foes, Avhose idols fell, 

" There is a God in Israel." 

Now, David's tabernacle gone, 

What mighty builder shall restore ? 

The golden throne of Solomon, 
And ivory palace are no more ; 
The Psalmist's song, the Preacher's lore, 

Of all they wrought, alone remain 

Unperish'd trophies of their reign. 

Holy and beautiful of old. 

Was Zion 'midst her princely bowers ; 
Besiegers trembled to behold 

Bulwarks that set at naught their powers ; 

— Swept from the earth are all her towers ; 
Nor is there — so was she bereft — 
One stone upon another left. 

The very site whereon she stood. 

In vain the eye, the foot would trace ; 

Vengeance, for saints' and martyrs' blood, 
Her walls did utterly deface ; 
Dungeons and dens usurp their place ; 

The cross and crescent shine afar. 

But where is Jacob's natal star ? 

Part II. 

Still inexterminable, still 

Devoted to their mother-land. 

Her offspring huunt the temple-hill. 
Amidst her desecration stand, 
And bite the lip, and clench the hand ; 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



— To-day in that lone vale they weep, 
Where patriarchs, kings, and prophets sleep. 

Ha ! what a spectacle of wo ! 

In groups they settle on the ground ; 
Men, women, children gathering slow. 

Sink down in reverie profound ; 

There is no voice, no speech, no sound. 
But through the shuddering frame is thrown 
The heart's unutterable groan. 

Entranced they sit, nor seem to breathe. 
Themselves like spectres from the dead ; 

Where shrined in rocks above, beneath, 
With clods along the valley spread, 
Their ancestors, each on his bed. 

Repose, till at the judgment-day. 

Death and the grave give up their prey. 

Before their eyes, as in a glass, 

— Their eyes that gaze on vacancy — 

Pageants of ancient grandeur pass. 
But, " Ichabod" on all they see 
Brands Israel's foul apostasy ; 

— Then last and worst, and crowning all 

Their crimes and sufferings — Salem's fall. 

Nor breeze, nor bird, nor palm-tree stirs, 
Kedron's unwater'd brook is dumb ; 

But through the glen of sepulchres 
Is heard the city's fervid hum. 
Voices of dogs and children come : 

Till loud and long the medzin's* cry. 

From Omar's mosque, peals round the sky. 

Bhght through their veins those accents send ; 
In agony of mute despair, 



* More properly " niueilhiii's," the person whose business it is to call the Mo- 
hammedans to prayer ; no bells being used by them for that purpose. 



THE TOMBS OF THE FATHERS. 



Their garments, as by stealth, they rend ; 

Unconsciously they pluck their hair ; 

— This is the Moslem's hoar of prayer! 
'Twas Judah's once, — but fane and priest, 
Altar and sacrifice, have ceased. 

And by the Gentiles, in their pride, 

Jerusalem is trodden down : 
— " How long ? — for ever wilt thou hide 

Thy face, O Lord ; — for ever frown ? 

Israel Avas once thy glorious crown, 
In sight of all the nations worn ; 
Now from thy brow in anger torn. 

" Zion, forsaken and forgot, 
j Hath felt thy stroke, and owns it just : 

O God, our God I reject us not, 
j Her sons take pleasure in her dust : 

How is the fine gold dimm'd with rust ! 

The city throned in gorgeous state. 

How doth she now sit desolate ! 

" Where is thine oath to David sworn ? 

We by the winds like chaff are driven: 
Yet unto us a child is born, 

Yet unto us a Son is given ; 

His throne is as the days of Heaven : 
When shall He come to our release. 
The mighty God, the Prince of Peace ?" 

Part III. 

Thus blind with unbelief they cry. 
But hope revisits not their glooms ; 

Seal'd are the words of prophecy, 
Seal'd as the secrets of yon tombs, 
Where all is dark, — though nature blooms, 

Birds sing, streams murmur, heaven above, 

And earth around, are Hfe, light, love. 



The sun goes down ; — the mourning crowds, 
Re-quicken'd, as from slumber start ; 

They met in silence here like clouds, 
Like clouds in silence they depart : 
Still clings the thought to every heart. 

Still from their lips escapes in sighs, 

— " By whom shall Jacob yet arise ?" 

By whom shall Jacob yet arise ? 

— Even by the Power that wakes the dead ; 

He whom your fathers did despise, 
He who for you on Calvary bled. 
On Zion shall his ensign spread ; 

— ^Captives ! by all the world enslaved, 

Know your Redeemer, and be saved ! 



THE SUN-FLOWER. 



Eagle of flowers ! I see thee stand. 

And on the sun's noon-glory gaze ; 
With eye Hke his, thy lids expand. 

And fringe their disk with golden rays : 
Though fix'd on earth, in darkness rooted there, 
Light is thine element, thy dwelling air, 
Thy prospect heaven. 

So would mine eagle-soul descry. 

Beyond the path where planets run. 
The hght of immortality, 

The splendour of creation's sun ; 
Though sprung from earth, and hastening to the tomb, 
In hope a flower of paradise to bloom, 
I look to heaven. 



FOR J. S., 

A PREAMBLE TO HER ALBUM. 

" Ut pictura poesis." — Hor. De Arte Poetica, v. 361. 

Two lovely sisters here unite 

To blend improvement with delight, — 

Painting and Poetry engage 

To deck by turns the varied page. 

Here every glowing picture be 
The quintessence of poesy, 
With skill so exquisitely wrought 
As if the colours were pure thought, 
— Thought, from the bosom's inmost cell, 
By magic tints made visible, 
That, while the eye admires, the mind, 
As in a glass, itself may find. 

And may the Poet's verse, alike. 
With all the power of painting strike, 
So freely, so divinely trace 
In every line, " the line of grace," 
And beautify with such sweet art 
The image-chamber of the heart. 
That Fancy here may gaze her fill. 
Forming fresh scenes and shapes at will, 
Where silent woods alone appear. 
Or, borrowing voice, but touch the ear. 

Yet humble Prose with these shall stand. 
Friends, kindred, comrades, hand in land, 
All in this fair enclosure meet. 
The lady of the book to greet. 
And, with the pen or pencil, make 
The leaves love-tokens for her sake. 




TO CYNTHIA: 

A young Lady, unknown to the Author, who, by letter, requested "a stanza,' 
" a few lines in his handwriting." 

Spirits in heaven can interchange 
Thoughts without voice or sound ; 
Spirits on earth at will can range, 
Wherever man is found ; 
Their thoughts (as silent and as fleet 
As summer h'ghtnings in the west, 
When evening sinks to glorious rest,) 
In written symbols meet. 

The motion of a feather darts 
The secrets of sequester'd hearts 
To kindred hearts afar ; 
As, in the stillness of the night, 
Quick rays of interminghng light 
Sparkle from star to star. 

A spirit to a spirit speaks, 
Where these few letters stand ; 
Strangers alike, — the younger seeks 
A token from the hand. 
That traced an unpretending song, 
Whose numbers won her gentle soul. 
While, like a mountain-rill, they stole 
In trembhng harmony along : — 
What shall the poet's spirit send 
To his unseen, unseeing friend ? 
— A wish as pure as e'er had birth 
In thought or language of this earth. 

Cynthia is young, — may she be old ; 
And fair no doubt, — may she grow wrinkled ; 
Her locks, in verse at least, are gold, 
May they turn silver, thinly sprinkled ; 
The rose her cheek, the fire her eye. 
Youth, health, and strength successive fly. 
And in the end, — may Cynthia die ! 



ON A WATCH-POCKET. 



" Unkind ! inhuman !" — Stay your tears ; 
I only wish you length of years ; 
And wish them still, with all their woes, 
And all their blessings, till the close ; 
For hope and fear, with anxious strife. 
Are wrestlers in the ring of life, 
And yesterday, to-day, to-morrow 
Are but alternate joy and sorrow. 

Now mark the sequel : — may your mind. 
In wisdom's paths, true pleasure find. 
Grow strong in virtue, rich in truth, 
And year by year renew its youth ; 
Till, in the last triumphant hour, 
The spirit shall the Jlesh o'erpower, 
This from its sufferings gain release. 
And that take wing, and part in peace. 



ON A WATCH-POCKET 

WORKED BY A. L. 

Within this curious case. 
Time's sentinel I place. 
Who, while calm, unconscious slumber 
Shuts creation from mine eyes. 
Through the silent gloom shall number 
Every moment as it flics, 
And record, at dawn of day, 
Thrice ten thousand past away. 
On each of these, my breath 
May pause 'twixt life and death, 
By a subtler line depending 
Than the ray of twinkling light, 
Which the smallest star is sending. 
Every instant, through the night ; 



Yea, on films more finely spun, 
All things hang, beneath the sun. 

Rapt through a wiklering dream, 
Awake in sleep I seem ; 
Sorrow wrings my soul with anguish, 
Joy expands my throbbing breast ; 
Now, o'erwhelm'd with care, I languish, 
Now serene and tranquil rest ; 
— Morning comes, and all between 
Is as though it ne'er had been. 

But Time has daylight hours, 
And man, immortal powers ; 
Waking joy and sleepless sorrow. 
Worldly care and heavenly peace ; 
Life, renew'd with every morrow, 
Not in death itself shall cease ; 
Man, through all eternity. 
What he here hath been shall be. 

May she, whose skilful hand 
This fairy net-work plann'd, 
Still, in innocent employment. 
Far from vanity and vice. 
Seek the Pearl of pure enjoyment. 
On her path to Paradise ; 
Time, for earth or heaven, employ'd, 
(Both have claims) is time enjoy 'd. 

Each day to her, in flight, 
Bequeath a gem at night ; 
Some sweet hope, some hallow'd pleasure. 
From remembrance ne'er to part : 
Hourly blessings swell the treasure 
Hidden in her grateful heart. 
And may every moment past 
Leave a ray to gild her last. 



AN INFANT'S ALBUM. 



AN INFANT'S ALBUM. 



A. H. R. to her Friends and Contributors, written to accompany her Portrait, at 
the beginning of the Book. 

Now look upon my face, and say, 
If you can turn your eyes away. 
Nor grant the little boon I ask, 
As if it were some mighty task. 

What is it ? — Only take your pen, 
Look wise, and think a moment, — then 
Write any thing, to which, for shame, 
You need not fear to put your name ; 
Or, with the pencil's curious skill, 
Draw flowers, birds, figures, — what you will ; 
I, like my elders and my betters. 
Love pictures quite as well as letters. 
Thus, page by page, my album store, 
Till it an album be no more, 
But, richly fiU'd, from end to end. 
On every leaf present a Friend. 

Now look upon my face, and see 
Yourself, your very self, in me ; 
Were you not once as mild and meek, 
With lip demure, and plump round cheek ? 
Did you not sometimes, too, look sly 
Out of the corner of your eye. 
As if you held an infant's jest, 
Like a bird fluttering, to your breast. 
Which wanted but an inch of wing, 
Up through the air to soar and sing ? 
So I can feign to hide a joke. 
And be as arch as graver folk. 

Well, time runs on, and I, j'ou know, 
As tall and stout as you may grow. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



Nay, more unlike my portrait here, 
Than you just now hke me appear. 
Ah ! then, if I must change so fast, 
What will become of me at last ? 
— A poor, old woman of fourscore ! 
That's a long way to look before, 
So I would learn of you, meanwhile. 
How best the journey to beguile. 
Look in my face again, you'll find 
The album of an infant's mind, 
Unsoil'd by care, unworn by grief. 
Like new-fall'n snow each maiden-leaf. 
On which, if not in black and white, 
In hnes eternal, you may write 
All that is lovely, pure, and good. 
To be possess'd or understood. 

Then, in this volume, as it lies. 
Trace words and pictures to my eyes. 
Which, thence, their mystic way may find, 
Into that album of my mind, 
And there impress each opening page. 
With thoughts for childhood, youth, and age 
Breathe a sweet spirit through the whole. 
That, like a soul within my soul. 
Shall, by the early impulse given. 
Guide me on earth, and bring to heaven. 
Let every leaf unfold a text, 
Either for this world or the next ; 
To learn of each, I'm nothing loth. 
They tell me I was born for both. 
Let mirth with innocence combine. 
And human knowledge aid divine. 

Thus form'd by it, and it by you. 
This Book shall render each their due ; 
For wlioso peeps therein may start. 
As though he look'd into my heart : 
And if he did, you must beware. 
That he would see your image there ; 



TO MARGARET. 



Then grant the boon with such a grace, 
That you may have a good, wa) m place : 
— Walk in, walk in ; my heart, though small. 
Is large enough to hold you all. 



TO MARGARET; 



A little girl, who begged to have some verses from the author, at Scarborough, 
in 1814. 

Margaret ! we never met before. 
And, Margaret ! we may meet no more ; 
What shall I say at parting ? 
Scarce half a moon has run her race, 
Since first I saw your fairy-face. 
Around this gay and giddy placi^. 
Sweet smiles and blushes dartiny; 
Yet from my soul, I frankly tell, 
I cannot help but wish you well. 

I dare not wish you stores of v/ealth, 
A troop of friends, unfailing heaLh, 
And freedom from affliction ; 
I dare not wish you beauty's prize, 
Carnation lips, and bright blue ej es. 
These look through tears, those brtiathe in sighs ;— 
Hear then my benediction ; 
Of these good gifts be you posses t 
Just in the measure God sees be.'t. 

But, little Margaret, may you oe 
All that His eye delights to see, 
All that He loves and blesses ; 
The Lord in darkness be your Ight, 
Your help in need, your shield in fight. 
Your comfort in distresses ; 
Your hope through every futuie breath, 
And your eternal joy in death ! 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



THE BLANK LEAF. 

Fair page ! the eye that looks on thee 
Ere long shall slumber in the dust, 

And wake no more, until it see 
The resurrection of the just : 

— May He, to whom that eye belongs, 

Join their assembly and their songs. 

Whose is that eye ? — Just now 'tis mine. 

But, reader ! when thou look'st 'tis thine. 



THE GNAT. 



Written with pencil round an insect of that kind, which had been accidentally 
crushed, and remained fixed on a blank page of a Lady's Album. 

Lie here embalm'd, from age to age ; 
This is the album's noblest page, 
Though every glowing leaf be fraught 
With painting, poetry, and thought ; 
Where tracks of mortal hands are seen, 
A hand invisible hath been, 
And left this autograph behind. 
This image from th' eternal Mind ; 
A work of skill, surpassing sense, 
A labour of Omnipotence ; 
Though frail as dust it meet thine eye, 
He form'd this gnat who built the sky. 

Stop — lest it vanish at thy breath. 
This speck had life, and sufTer'd death. 

1832 



MORNA. 

Macpherson's Ossian has had many admirers ; and it cannot be denied, that the 
compositions attributed to the son of Fingal abound with striking imagery, 
heroic sentiment, and liardy expression, the effect of which, on young minds 
especially, may be highly exhilarating for a while. But, independent of the 
obscurity, sameness, and repetition, which were probably characteristic of the 
originals— whatever those originals may have been — llie translation is " done 
into English," in such a " Babylonish dialect," that, it might be presumed, 
no ear accustomed to the melody of pure prose or thg freedom of eloquent 
verse, could endure the incongruities of a style, in which broken verse of 
various measures, and halting prose of almost unmanageable cadences, com- 
pound sentences as difficult to read and as dissonant to hear, as a strain of 
music would be in execution and effect, if every bar were set to a different 
time and in a different key. If for such wild works of imagination a corre- 
sponding diction be desirable, a style between prose and verse, not a heteroge- 
neous jumbling of both, might perhaps be invented. For this we must have a 
poetical foundation with a prose superstructure ; the former, that the vehicle 
of thought may admit of florid embellishment; the latter, that full license may 
be obtained of accommodating, by expansion or contraction, the scope of the 
ideas, unincumbered with rhyme, and unrestricted by infrangible metrical 
trammels. 

The episode of Morna is, perhaps, the most truly beautiful and pathetic, as well 
as simple and intelligible, narrative among these rhapsodical productions. 
In the following experiment, which is submitted to the curious, the anapastic 
foot is adopted as the groundwork, because cadences of that measure have 
peculiar fluency. There is some difliculty, indeed, to the reader, in hitting 
the right accents at all times, from the great laxity of our language in that 
respect, and the carelessness of writers; yet as this movement admits of the 
utmost variety of subdivisions, and the lines may be lengthened or shortened, 
according to the burden of the matter of each, it is well suited to a mode of 
composition, which would blend the harmony of song with the freedom of dis- 
course, if such union were compatible. This, to some extent, has been proved 
practicable in many passages of several English translations of the Psalms 
and the Prophecies, of which a very perfect specimen may be found in the 
first seven verses of the ninety-fifth Psalm, according to the Common Prayer- 
book rendering. When read with simplicity, and the due accent laid upon the 
long syllables,nothing perhaps in human speech can be quoted more delicately 
implicated than the clauses, or more melodious than the sequence of plain 
Saxon sounds that compose the diction, while the variety of cadence and the 
change of cesura in every turn of the thought is not less admirable. The strain 
passes into entirely another key from the eighth verse inclusive to the end, 
the theme in fact suggesting a correspondent change to the minstrel's hand, 
when he drops the hortatory preamble, and proceeds to the historical argu- 
ment, or rather, when he gives way abruptly at the sound of the very voice 
to which he is calling upon his hearers to hearken ; while Jehovah himself 
from between the cherubim (for the scene is in the temple) speaks out, 
"Harden not your iiearts, as in the provocation » * * * when your fathers 
tempted me, proved me, and saw my works," &c., to the fearful close of ihe 
psalm. 



MISCELLANEOUS P0P:MS 



The following attempt to tame what has been called "prose run mad," into 
what may easily be designated by a phrase not less opprobrious, is made upon 
a principle more strictly rhythmical than the measured style of our vernacular 
translations of Scripture poetry ; and in behalf of it a claim to be received 
with indulpenc! by the admirers of Gaelic legends may be fairly preferred, 
since the offen' e, if it be one, against good taste is not likely to be imitated, 
nor will the original culprit soon be induced to repeat it, being himself of 
opinion, that tliough a few pages got up in this manner may not be unpleasing, 
a volume would be intolerable. 

It may be necessary to add, that this experiment on the tale of Morna has not 
been made from Macph^rson, but from a version of Fingal, of which a few 
copies only were printed at Edinburgh some years ago, for private circulation. 
Whether the work has ever been further published, the present writer knows 
not ; but it appeared to him, on the hasty perusal of a lent copy, preferable to 
the old one. 

THE ARGUMENT. 

Cathbat and Morna are lovers. Duchdmar, the rival of Caihbat, having slain 
the latter in the chase, meets Morna, tells her what he has done, and wooes 
her for himself. In the course of the interview they fall by each other's hands, 
and die together. — The story is supposed to be related to CuchuUin, general 
of the tribes of Erin, who, at the conclusion, laments the premature loss of the 
two valiant warriors, and the death of the maiden. 

Cathbat fell by the sword of Duchomar, 
At the oak of the loud-roUing stream ; 
Duchomar came to the cave of the forest, 
And spake to the gentle maid. 

" Morna ! fairest of women ! 
Beautiful daughter of high-born Cormac ! 
Wherefore alone in the circle of stones, 
Alone at the cave of the mountain ? 
The old oak sounds in the wind, 
That ruffles the distant lake ; 
Black clouds engirdle the gloomy horizon ; 
But thou art like snow on the heath ; 
Thy ringlets resemble the light mist of Cromla, 
When it winds round the sides of the hill, 
In the beams of the evening sun." 

" Whence comest thou, sternest of men ?" 
Said the maid of the graceful locks ; 
" Evermore dark was thy brow ; 
Now red is thine eye, and ferocious ; 
Dolh Swaram appear on the sea ? 
What tidincs from Lochlin ?" 



" No tidings from Lochlin, O Moma ! 
I come from the mountains ; 
I come from the chase of the fleet-footed hind : 
Three red deer have fallen by my arrows ; 
One fell for thee, fair daughter of Cormac ! 
As my soul do I love thee, white-handed maiden ! 
Queen of the hearts of men !" 

" Duchomar !" the maiden rephed, 
" None of my love is for thee : 
Dark is thine eyebrow, thy bosom is darker. 
And hard as the rock is thine heart : 
But, thou, the dear offspring of Armin, 
Cathbat ! art JVIorna's love. 
Bright as the sunbeams thy beautiful locks. 
When the mist of the valley is climbing the mountain ; 
Saw'st thou the chief, the young hero, 
Cathbat the brave, in thy course on the hill ? 
The daughter of Cormac the mighty 
Tarries to welcome her love from the field." 

" Long shalt thou tarry, O Morna !" 
Sullenly, fiercely, Duchomar replied : 
•' Long shalt thou tarry, O Morna ! 
To welcome the rude son of Armin ! 
Lo ! on this sharp-edged sword. 
Red to the hilt is the life-blood of Cathbat: 
Slain is thine hero. 
By me he was slain : 
His cairn will I build upon Cromla. 
— Daughter of blue-shielded Cormac ! 
Turn on Duchomar thine eye." 

" Fallen in death is the brave son of Armin ?" 
The maiden exclaim'd with the voice of love : 
" Fallen in death on the pine-crested hill ? 
The loveliest youth of the host ! 
Of heroes the first in the chase ! 
The direst of foes to the sea-roving stranger ! — 
Dark is Duchomar in wrath ; 
Deadly his arm to me ; 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



Foe unto Morna ! — ^but lend me thy weapon, 
Cathbat I loved, and I love his blood." 

He yielded the sword to her tears ; 
She plunged the red blade through his side ; 
He fell by the stream ; 

He stretch'd forth his hand, and his voice was heard: 
" Daughter of blue-shielded Cormac ! 
Thou hast cut off my youth from renown ; 
Cold is the sword, the glory of heroes, 
Cold in my bosom, O Morna I 
— Ah ! give me to Moina the maiden, 
For I am her dream in the darkness of night ; 
My tomb she will build in the midst of the camp. 
That the hunter may hail the bright mark of my fame. 
— But draw forth the sword from my bosom, 
For cold is the blade, O Morna !" 

Slowly and weeping she came, 
And drew forth the sword from his side ; 
He seized it, and struck the red steel to her heart ; 
She fell : — on the earth lay her tresses dishevell'd. 
The blood gurgled fast from the wound, 
And crimson'd her arm of snow. 

* * * * 

" Tell me no more of the maiden !" 
CuchuUin, the war-chief of Erin replied : 
— " Peace to the souls of the heroes ! 
Their prowess was great in the conflict of swords ; 
Let them glide by my chariot in war ! 
Let their spirits appear in the clouds o'er the valley ! 
So shall my breast be undaunted in danger ! 

" Be thou hke a moon-beam, O Morna ! 
When my sight is beginning to fail ; 
When my soul is reposing in peace, 
And the tumult of war is no more." 



THE VALENTINE WREATH. 



THE VALENTINE WREATH. 

Rosy-red the hills appear 

With the light of morning, 

Beauteous clouds, in ether clear, 

All the east adorning ; 

White through mist the meadows shine, 

Wake, my love, my Valentine ! 

For thy locks of raven-hue, 
Flowers with hoar-frost pearly, 
Crocus-cups of gold and blue, 
Snowdrops drooping early, 
With mezereon-sprigs combine ; 
Rise, my love, my Valentine ! 

O'er the margin of the flood. 
Pluck the daisy, peeping ; 
Through the dry leaves in the wood, 
Hunt the sorrel creeping ; 
With the little celandine. 
Crown my love, my Valentine ! 

Pansies, on their lowly stems, 
Scatter'd o'er the fallows ; 
Hazel-buds, with crimson gems, 
Green and glossy sallows ; 
Tufted moss and ivy-twine, 
Deck my love, my Valentine ! 

Few and simple flowerets these ; 
Yet to me less glorious, 
Grarden-beds and orchard-trees. 
Since this wreath victorious 
Binds thee now for ever mine, 
O my love, my Valentine ! 



1811. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



THE WIDOW. 

Written at the request of a Lady, who furnished several of the lines and the 
plan of the whole. 

Ah ! who is she that sits and weeps, 
And gazes on the narrow mound ? 
— In that fresh grave her true love sleeps, 
Her heart lies with him in the ground : 
She heeds not, while her babe, at play. 
Plucks the frail flowers, that gaily bloom. 
And casts them, ere they fade away. 
In garlands, on its father's tomb ; 
— Unconscious where its father lies, 
" Sweets to the sweet !" the prattler cries ; 
Ah ! then she starts, looks up, her eyes o'erflow 
With all a mother's love, and all a widow's wo. 

Again she turns away her head, 

Nor marks her infant's sportive air, 

Its cherub-cheeks all rosy-red, 

Its sweet blue eyes and ringlet-hair ; 

Silent she turns away her head. 

Nor dare behold that smile-bright face. 

Where hve the features of the dead 

In lineaments of fairy-grace : 

For there at once, with transport wild. 

She sees her husband and her child ; 
Ah ! then her bosom burns, her eyes o'erflow 
With all a mother's love, and all a widow's wo. 

And still I find her sitting here. 
Though dark October frowns on all ; 
And from the lime-trees rustling near. 
The scatter'd leaves around her fall ; 



THE WIDOW. 441 



O then it charms her inmost soul, 

It suits the sadness of her mind, 

To watch the clouds of autumn roll, 

And listen to the moaning wind ; 

In every shadow, every blast, 

The spirits of enjoyments past, 
She sees, she hears : — ah ! then her eyes o'erflow 
Not with the mother's love, but with the widow's wo. 

Yon peasant dreads a gathering storm, 

Yet pauses as he hastens by, 

Marks the pale ruin of her form. 

The desolation of her eye ; 

Beholds her babe for shelter creep 

Behind the grave-stone's dreary shade, 

Where all its father's sorrows sleep, 

And all its mother's hopes are laid ; 

Remembering then his own heart's joy, 

A rosy wife, a blooming boy ; 
" Ah me !" he sighs, " when I am thus laid low, 
Must my poor partner feel a widow'd mother's wo?" 

He gently stretches out his arm, 
And calls the babe in accents mild ; 
The mother shrieks with strange alarm. 
And snatches up her wondering child ; 
She thought that voice of tender tone. 
Those accents soft, endearing, kind. 
Came from beneath the hollow stone ! 
— He marks the wandering of her mind, 
And thankful for his happier lot. 
Seeks the warm comforts of his cot ; 

He meets his wife ; — ah ! then his eyes o'erflow ; 

She feels a mother's love, nor dreads a widow's wo. 

The storm retires ; — and hark ! the bird. 
The lonely bird of autumn's reign, 
From the church pinnacle is heard ; 
O what a clear and simple strain ! 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



See the delighted mourner start, 
While Robin red-breast's evening song 
Pours all its sweetness through her heart, 
And soothes it as it trills along : 
Then gleams her eye, her fancy hears 
The warbled music of the spheres ; 
She clasps her babe ; she feels her bosom glow, 
And in a mother's love forgets a widow's wo. 

Go to thine home, forsaken fair ! 

Go to thy sohtary home ; 

Thou lovely pilgrim, in despair, 

To thy saint's shrine no longer roam; 

He rests not here ; — thy soul's dehght 

Attends where'er thy footsteps tread ; 

He watches in the depth of night, 

A guardian-angel round thy bed ; 

And still a father, fondly kind. 

Eyes the dear pledge he left behind : 
So love may deem, and death may prove it so : 
— In heaven at least there is no widow's wo ; 
Thither, in following him, with thy sweet infant go. 



MOTTO TO "A POET'S PORTFOLIO." 

(fragment of a page of oblivion.) 

Fall'n feathers of a moulting wing, 

Which ne'er again may soar ; 

Notes, sung in autumn woods, where Spring 

Shall hear their sounds no more: 

Her voice and plume — the bird renews ; 

Man fails but once ; — 'tis in the tomb, 

His strength he mews. 

1835. 



AT HOME IN HEAVEN. 



AT HOME IN HEAVEN. 

1 THBS8. iv. 17. 

Part I. 

"For ever with the Lord !" 

— Amen, so let it be ; 
Life from the dead is in that word, 

'Tis immortahty. 

Here in the body pent. 

Absent from Him I roam ; 
Yet nightly pitch my moving tent 

A day's march nearer home. 

My Father's house on high, 
Home of my soul, how near. 

At times, to faith's foreseeing eye, 
Thy golden gates appear ! 

Ah ! then my spirit faints 

To reach the land I love. 
The bright inheritance of saints, 

Jerusalem above. 

Yet clouds will intervene, 
And all my prospect flies ; 

Like Noah's dove, I flit between 
Rough seas and stormy skies. 

Anon the clouds dispart, 

The winds and waters cease, 

While sweetly o'er my gladden'd heart 
Expands the bow of peace. 




Beneath its glowing arch, 
Along the hallow'd ground, 

I see cherubic armies march, 
A camp of fire around. 

I hear at morn and even, 
At noon and midnight hour, 

The choral harmonies of heaven 
Earth's Babel-tongues o'erpower. 

Then, then I feel that He, 

(Remember'd or forgot,) 
The Lord is never far from me, 

Though I perceive Him not. 

Part II. 

In darkness as in light, 

Hidden alike from view, 
I sleep, I wake within his sight, 

Who looks existence through. 

From the dim hour of birth. 
Through every changing state 

Of mortal pilgrimage on earth, 
Till its appointed date ; 

All that I am, have been. 

All that I yet may be. 
He sees at once, as He hath seen. 

And shall for ever see. 

How can I meet His eyes ? 

Mine on the cross I cast, 
And own my life a Saviour's prize, 

Mercy from first to last. 

" For ever with the Lord !" 
—Father, if 'tis thy will, 

The promise of that faithful word, 
Even here to me fulfil. 



AT HOME IN HEAVEN. 



Be thou at my right hand, 

Then can I never fail ; 
Uphold Thou me, and I shall stand. 

Fight, and I must prevail. 

So when my latest breath 

Shall rend the veil in twain. 
By death I shall escape from death. 

And life eternal gain. 

Knowing as I am known. 

How shall I love that word. 
And oft repeat before the throne, 

" For ever with the Lord !" 

Then though the soul enjoy 

Communion high and sweet, 
While worms this body must destroy, 

Both shall in glory meet. 

The trump of final doom 

Will speak the self-oame word. 
And heaven's voice thunder through the tomb, 

" For ever Avith the Lord !" 

The tomb shall echo deep 

That death-awakening sound ; 
The saints shall hear it in their sleep, 

And answer from the ground. 

Then upward as they fly. 

That resurrection-word 
Shall be their shout of victory, 

"For ever with the Lord !" 

That resurrection-word, 

That shout of victorj'-. 
Once more, — " For ever with the Lord !" 

Amen, so let it be. 




There is a veil no mortal hand can draw, 
Which hides what eye of mortal never saw ; 
Through that (each moment by the dying riven) 
Could but a glance be to the living given, 
How into nothing, less than nothing, all 
Life's vanities, life's verities would fall. 
And that alone of priceless worth be deem'd, 
Which is most lightly by the world esteem'd ! 

Enough is known ; there is a heaven, a hell ; 
Who 'scapes the last and wins the first doth well : 
Whither away, my soul ! — in which wouldst thou 
Emerge from life, were death to smite me now ? 

1834; 



HEAVEN IN PROSPECT. 

Palms of glory, raiment bright, 
Crowns that never fade away, 

Gird and deck the saints in hght. 

Priests and kings and conquerors they. 

Yet the conquerors bring their palms 
To the Lamb amidst the throne, 

And proclaim, in joyful psalms. 
Victory through his cross alone. 

Kings for harps their crowns resign, 
Crying, as they strike the chords, 

" Take the kingdom, — it is thine. 
King of kings and Lord of lords." 

Round the altar, priests confess. 
If their robes are white as snow, 

'Twas the Saviour's righteousness, 
And his blood that made them so. 



ON THE FIRST LEAF OF JIISS J.'S ALBUM. 



Who were these ? — on earth they dwelt, 
Sinners once of Adam's race, 

Guilt, and fear, and suffering felt, 
But were saved by sovereign grace. 

They were mortal, too, like us ; 

— Ah ! when we, like them, shall die. 
May our souls, translated thus. 

Triumph, reign, and shine on high ! 



FIRST LEAF OF MISS J.'S ALBUM. 

What thoughts, beyond the reach of thought 

To guess what they may be. 
Shall in succession here be brought 

From depths no eye can see ! 

Those thoughts are now upon their way. 

Like light from stars unseen, 
Though, ere they reach us, many a day 

And year may intervene :— 

Thoughts, which shall spring in friendship's breast. 

Or genius touch with fire ; 
Thoughts, which good angels may suggest, 

Or God himself inspire. 

Such, o'er these pages pure and. white, 

By many a willing hand, 
Be writ in characters of light. 

And here unfading stand ! 

That she who owns the whole may find, 

Reveal'd in every part. 
The trace of some ingenuous mind. 

The love of some warm heart. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



THE SAND AND THE ROCK. 

"I will open my dark saying upon the harp."— Psuim xlix. 4. 

Part I. 

DESTRUCTION. 

I BUILT my house upon the sand, 

And saw its image in the sea, 
That seem'd as stable as the land. 

And beautiful as heaven to me. 

For in the clear and tranquil tide, 

As in a nether firmament, 
Sun, moon, and stars appear'd to ghde. 

And lights and shadows came and went. 

I ate and drank, I danced and sung. 
Reclined at ease, at leisure stroll'd, 

Collecting shells and pebbles, flung 
Upon the beach, for gems and gold. 

I said unto my soul, " Rejoice ! 

In safety, wealth, and pleasure here ;" 
But while I spake, a secret voice, 

Within my bosom, Avhisper'd "Fear!" 

I heeded not, and went to rest, 

Prayerless, once more, beneath my roof. 
Nor deem'd the eagle on his nest 

More peril-free, more tempest-proof. 

But in the dead and midnight hour 
A storm came down upon the deep ; 

Wind, rain, and lightning, such a stour, 
Methought 'twas doomsday in my sleep. 

I strove, but could not wake, — the stream 
Beat vehemently on my wall ; 



THE SAND AND THE ROCK. 



I felt it tottering in m}' dream ; 
It fell, and dreadful was the fall. 

Swept with the ruins down the flood, 

I woke ; home, hope, and heart were gone ; 

My brain flash'd fire, ice thrill'd my blood ; 
Life, life was all I thought upon. 

Death, death was all that met my eye ; 

Deep swallow'd deep, wave buried wave ; 
I look'd in vain for land and sky ; 

All was one sea, — that sea one grave. 
I struggled through the strangling tide. 

As though a bowstring wrung my neck ; 
" Help ! help !" voice fail'd, — I fain had cried. 

And clung convulsive to the wreck. 
Not long, — for suddenly a spot 

Of darkness fell upon my brain. 
Which spread and press'd, till I forgot 

All pain in that excess of pain. 

Part II. 

TRANSITION. 

Two woes were past ; a worse befell ; 

When I revived, the sea had fled ; 
Beneath me yawned the gulf of hell, 

Broad as the vanish'd ocean's bed. 

Downward I seem'd to plunge through space, 
As lightning flashes and expires, 

Yet — how I knew not — turn'd my face 
Away from those terrific fires ; — 

And saw, in glory throned afar, 

A human form yet all divine ; 
Beyond the track of sun or star. 

High o'er all height it seem'd to shine. 

'Twas He who in the furnace walk'd 

With Shadrach, and controll'd its power ; , 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



'Twas He with whom Elias talk'd, 
In his transfiguration-hour. 

'Twas He whom, in the lonely Isle 

Of Patmos, John in spirit saw ; 
And at the lightning of his smile, 

Fell down as dead, entranced with awe. 

From his resplendent diadem, 

A ray shot through mine inmost soul ; 

"Could I but touch his garment's hem," 

Methought, " like her whom faith made whole !' 

Faith, faith was given ; — though nigh and nigher, 
Swift verging tow'rds the gulf below, 

I stretch'd my hand ; — but high and higher, 
Ah me ! the vision seem'd to go. 

" Save, Lord, I perish !" — while I cried, 

Some miracle of mercy drew 
My spirit upward ; — hell yawn'd wide. 

And follow'd ; — upwards still I flew: — 

And upwards still the surging flame 
Pursued ; — yet all was clear above. 

Whence brighter, sweeter, kindher came 
My blessed Saviour's looks of love. 

Till with a sudden flash forth beam'd 

The fulness of the Deity : — 
Hell's jaws collapsed ; I felt redeem'd ; 

The snare was broken, I was free. 

A voice from heaven proclaim'd, — " 'Tis done !" 
Then, like a homeward ray of light 

From the last planet to the sun, 

I darted through the abyss of night. 

Till He put forth his hand, to meet 

Mine, grasping at infinity ; 
He caught me, set me on my feet ; 

I fell at his in ecstasy. 



LOVEST THOU ME.' 



What follow'd, human tongue in vain 
Would question language to disclose : 

Enough, — that I was born again ; 
From death to life that hour I rose. 

Part III. 

RESTITUTION. 

I built once more, but on a rock 

(Faith's strong foundation firm and sure) 
Fix'd mine abode, the heaviest shock 

Of time and tempest to endure. 

Not small, nor large, not low, nor high, 
Midway it stands upon the steep. 

Beneath the storm-mark of the sky, 
Above the flood-mark of the deep. 

And here I humbly wait, while He, 
Who pluck'd me from the lowest hell. 

Prepares a heavenly house for me. 

Then calls me home with Him to dwell. 



LOVEST THOU ME ?" 

John xxl. 15—17. 



" Lovest thou me .^" I hear my Saviour say : 
Would that my heart had power to answer — " Yea : 
Thou knowest all things. Lord, in heaven above. 
And earth beneath ; Thou knowest that I love," 
But 'tis not so ; in word, in deed, in thought, 
I do not, cannot love thee as I ought ; 
Thy love must give that power, thy love alone ; 
There's nothing worthy of thee but thine OAvn ; 
Lord, with the love wherewith thou lovedst me. 
Reflected on th3^self, / would love thee. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



GARDEN THOUGHTS. 

On occasion of a Christian assembly in tlie grounds of a gentleman at York, for 
the purpose of promoting Missions among the Heathen. 

In a garden — ^man was placed, 

Meet abode for innocence, 
With his Maker's image graced ; 

— Sin crept in and drove him thence, 
Through the world, a wretch undone, 
Seeking rest, and finding none. 

In a garden — on that night, 

When our Saviour was betray'd, 
With what world-redeeming might. 

In his agony he pray'd ! 
Till he drank the vengeance up, 
And with mercy fill'd the cup. 

In a garden — on the cross. 

When the spear his heart had riven, 

And for earth's primeval loss. 

Heaven's best ransom had been given, 

—Jesus rested from his woes, 

Jesus from the dead arose. 

Here, not Eden's bowers are found, 

Nor forlorn Gethsemane, 
Nor that calm, sepulchral ground 

At the foot of Calvary ; 
— Yet this scene may well recall 
Sweet remembrances of all. 

Emblem of the church below ! 
Where the Spirit and the Word 



GARDEN THOUGHTS. 



Fall like dews, like breezes blow, 

And the Lord God's voice is heard. 
Walking in the cool of day, 
While the world is far away : — 

Emblem of the church above ! 

Where, as in their native clime. 
Midst the garden of his love. 

Rescued from the rage of time, 
Saints, as trees of hfe, shall stand. 
Planted by his own right hand ! 

Round the fair enclosure here 

Flames no cherub's threatening sword, 
Ye who enter feel no fear : 

— Roof'd by heaven, with verdure floor'd, 
Breathing balm from blossoms gay, 
This be paradise to-day. 

Yet one moment meditate 

On our parents' banishment. 
When from Eden's closing gate, 

Hand in hand, they weeping went, 
Spikenard groves no more to dress. 
But a thorn-set wilderness. 

Then remember Him who laid 

Uncreated splendour by. 
Lower than the angels made. 

Fallen man to glorify. 
And from death beyond the grave 
Until life immortal save. 

Think of Him — your souls He sought, 

Wandering, never to return ; 
Hath He found you ? — At the thought 

Your glad hearts within you burn ; 
Then your love like His extend. 
Be like Him the sinner's friend. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



O'er Jerusalem he wept, 

Doom'd to perish ; — can't you weep 
O'er a world, by Satan kept 

Dreaming in delirious sleep, 
Till the twinkle of an eye 
Wakes them in eternity ? 

Ye, who smile in rosy youth. 

Glow with manhood, fade through years, 
Send the Hfe, the light, the truth, 

To dead hearts, blind eyes, deaf ears, 
And your very pleasures make 
Charities for Jesus' sake. 

So shall gospel-glory run 

Round the globe, to every clime. 

Brighter than the circhng sun. 
Hastening that millennial time, 

When the earth shall be restored 

As the garden of the Lord. 

1829. 



TO MR. AND MRS. T.. 



WITH THE FOREGOING STANZAS. 

Ye who own this quiet place, 

Here, like Enoch, walk with God ; 

And, till summon'd hence, through grace. 
Tread the path your Saviour trod ; 

Then to paradise on high. 

With the wings of angels fly. 



THE FIELD OF THE WORLD. 

Sow in the mom thy seed, 

At eve hold not thine hand ; 
To doubt and fear give thou no heed, 

Broad-cast it o'er the land. 

Beside all waters sow. 

The highway furrows stock. 

Drop it where thorns and thistles grow. 
Scatter it on the rock. 

The good, the fruitful ground, 

Expect not here nor there : 
O'er hill and dale, by plots, 'tis found ; 

Go forth, then, everywhere. 

Thou know'st not which may thrive. 

The late or early sown ; 
Grace keeps the precious germs alive, 

When and wherever strown. 

And duly shall appear. 

In verdure, beauty, strength ; 

The tender blade, the stalk, the ear. 
And the full corn at length. 

Thou canst not toil in vain ; 

Cold, heat, and moist, and dry. 
Shall foster and mature the grain 

For garners in the sky. 

Thence, when the glorious end. 

The day of God is come, 
The angel-reapers shall descend, 

And Heaven cry—" Harvest-home !" 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



FAREWELL TO A MISSIONARY. 

Home, kindred, friends, and country, — these 
Are things with which we never part ; 

From clinme to clime, o'er land and seas, 
We bear them with us in our heart ; 

And yet 'tis hard to feel resign'd, 

When they must all be left behind. 

But when the pilgrim's staff we take. 
And follow Christ from shore to shore, 

Gladly for Him we all forsake. 
Press on, and only look before ; 

Though humbled nature mourns her loss, 

The spirit glories in the cross. 

It is no sin, like man, to weep. 

Even Jesus wept o'er Lazarus dead ; 

Or yearn for home beyond the deep, — 
He had not where to lay his head ; 

The patriot's tears will He condemn, 

Who grieved o'er lost Jerusalem ? 

Take up your cross, and say — " Farewell :" 
Go forth without the camp to Him, 

Who left heaven's throne with men to dwell, 
Who died his murderers to redeem : 

Oh ! tell his name in every ear, 

Doubt not, — the dead themselves will hear, — 

Hear, and come forth to life anew ; 

— Then while the Gentile courts they fill. 
Shall not your Saviour's words stand true ? 

Home, kindred, friends, and country still. 
In earth's last desert you shall find. 
Yet lose not those you left behind. 



THE PRISONER OF THE LORD. 



"THE PRISONER OF THE LORD.' 

A SABBATH HYMN FOR A SICK CHAMBER. 

Thousands, O Lord of Hosts ! this day, 

Around thine altar meet ; 
And tens of thousands throng to pay 

Their homage at Thy feet. 

They see Thy power and glory there, 

As I have seen them too ; 
They read, they h^ar, they join in prayer, 

As I was wont to do. 

They sing Thy deeds, as I have sung, 

In sweet and solemn lays ; 
Were I among them, my glad tongue 

Might Learn new themes of praise. 

For Thou art in their midst, to teach. 
When on Thy name they call ; 

And Thou hast blessings, Lord, for each. 
Hast blessings, Lord, for all. 

I, of such fellowship bereft. 

In spirit turn to Thee ; 
Oh ! hast Thou not a blessing left, 

A blessing, Lord, for me ? 

The dew lies thick on all the ground, 

Shall my poor fleece be dry 1 
The manna rains from heaven around, 

Shall I of hunger die ? 

Behold Thy prisoner ; — loose my bands. 

If 'tis Thy gracious Avill ; 
If not, — contented in thine hands. 

Behold Thy prisoner still ! 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



I may not to Thy courts repair, 
Yet here Thou surely art ; 

Lord, consecrate a house of prayer 
In my surrender'd heart. 

To faith reveal the things unseen, 
To hope, the joys untold ; 

Let love, Avilhout a veil between. 
Thy glory now behold. 

Oh ! make Thy face on me to shine. 
That doubt and fear may cease ; 

Lift up Thy countenance benign 
On me, — and give me peace. 



AN AFTER-THOUGHT. 

I CANNOT call affliction sweet. 

And yet 'twas good to bear ; 
Affliction brought me to Thy feet, 

And I found comfort there. 

My weaned soul was all resign'd 

To Thy most gracious will ; 
Oh ! had I kept that better mind. 

Or been afflicted still! 

Where are the vows which then I vow'd. 
The joys which then I knew ? 

Those vanish'd hke the morning cloud. 
These like the early dew. 

Lord, grant me grace for every day, 

Whate'er my state may be ; 
Through life, in death, with truth to say, 

"My God is all tome!" 



1831. 



OUR saviour's prayers. 



OUR SAVIOUR'S PRAYERS.* 

Preamble. 

High Priest for sinners, Jesus, Lord ! 

Whom as a man of griefs I see, 
Thy prayers on earth while I record. 

If still in heaven thou pray'st for me, 
My soul for thy soul's travail claim, 
I seek salvation in thy name. 

Part I. 

Baptized as for the dead he rose, 

With prayer, from Jordan's hallow'd flood ; 
Ere long, by persecuting foes, 

To be baptized in his own blood : 
The Father's voice proclaim'd the Son, 
The Spirit witness'd ; — these are one. 

Early he rose ere dawn of day. 
And to a desert place withdrew, 

There was he wont to watch and pray, 
Until his locks were wet with dew. 

And birds below, and beams above. 

Had warn'd him thence to works of love. 

At evening when his toils were o'er, 

He sent the multitudes away. 
And on the mountain or the shore. 

All night remain 'd alone to pray, 
Till o'er his head the stars grew dim : 
— When was the hour of rest for him ? 



* In these stanzas the Scripture quotations are from those passages to which 
direct reference is ijitended in the lines themselves, rather than to the corre- 
sponding accounts of the same transactions by others of the sacred historians. 



460 


MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 




In field or city when he taught, 


Mark 

»iii. 12. 


Oft went his spirit forth in sighs ; 




And when his mightiest deeds were wrought, 


Mark 
v.i. 34. 


To heaven he lifted up his eyes ; 




He pray'd at Lazarus' grave, and shed 


John «i. 
41—43. 


Tears, with the word that waked the dead. 




When mothers brought their babes, he took 


Nfall. 
xix. 13. 


Their lambs into his arms, and pray'd ; 




On Tabor, his transfigured look,^ 


Luke ii. 
28, 29. 


While praying, turn'd the sun to shade, 




And forms, too pure for human sight. 




Grew visible amidst his light. 




" Father ! save me from this hour. 




Yet for this hour to earth I came :" 




He pray'd in weakness ; then with power 




Cried, " Father ! glorify thy name :" 




" I have," a voice from heaven repHed, 


John Tii. 
28. 


" And still it shall be glorified." 




Part II. 


John 

ivi.i. 10. 


For Peter, bold in speech and brave 




In act, yet in temptation frail. 


Mitl. 
xiv. 31. 


(As once he proved him on the wave,) 


Luke 
i)cii. 32. 


He pray'd lest his weak faith should fail ; 




And when by Satan's snare enthrall'd. 


Luke 
lln.61. 


His eye the wanderer recall'd. 




Amidst his mournful family. 




Who soon must see his face no more. 




With what divine discourse did he 




Strength to their fainting souls restore ! 




Then pray'd for all his people : — where 


John 


Have words recorded such a prayer ! 


Heb. V. 


Next, with strong cries and bitter tears, 




Thrice hallowM he that doleful ground. 



OUR SAVIOUR S PRAYER. 



Where, trembling with mysterious fears, 
His sweat like blood-drops fell around, 
And being in an agony, 
He prayed yet more earnestly. 

Here oft in spirit let me kneel, 

Share in the speechless griefs I see, 

And while he felt what I should feel, 
Feel all his power of love to me. 

Break my hard heart, and grace supply 

For him who died for me to die. 

Stretch'd on the ignominious tree 

For those, whose hands had nail'd him there. 
Who stood and mock'd his misery, 

He offer'd up his latest prayer ; 
Then with the voice of victory cried, 
"'Tis finish'd," bow'd his head and died. 

Then all his prayers were answer'd ; — all 
The fruits of his soul's travail gain'd ; 

The cup of wormwood and of gall 

Down to the dregs his lips had drain'd ; 

Accomplish'd was the eternal plan, 

He tasted death for every man. 

Now by the throne of God he stands, 

Aloft the golden censer bears. 
And offers, with high priestly hands. 

Pure incense with his people's prayers : 
Well pleased the Father eyes the Son, 
And says to each request, " 'Tis done." 



39* 



REMINISCENCE. 
Remembrance of the dead revives 

The slain of time, at will ; 
Those who were lovely in their Hves, 

In death are lovelier still. 

Unburden'd with infirmity, 

Unplagued like mortal men, 
Oh with what pure delight we see 

The heart's old friends again ; 

Not as they sunk into the tomb, 
With sickness-wasted powers, 

But in the beauty and the bloom 
Of their best days and ours. 

The troubles of departed years 

Bring joys unknown before ; 
And soul-refreshing are the tears 

O'er wounds that bleed no more. 

Lightnings may blast, but thunder-showers 

Earth's ravaged face renew. 
With nectar fill the cups of flowers, 

And hang the thorns with dew. 

Remembrance of the dead is sweet ; 

Yet how imperfect this. 
Unless past, present, future, meet, 

— A threefold cord of bliss ! 

Companions of our youth, our age, 
With whom through life we Avalk'd, 

And in our house of pilgrimage, 
Of home beyond it talk'd : — 

Grief on their urn may fix her eyes, 
— They spring not from the ground ; 

Love may invoke them from the skies, 
—There is no voice nor sound. 



EVENING TIME. 



Fond memory marks them as they were, 

Stars in our horoscope ; 
But soon to see them as they are, 

— That is our dearest hope. 

Not through the darkness of the night, 
To waking thought unseal'd, 

But in the uncreated hght 
Of Deity reveal'd. 

TViey cannot come to us, but we 

Ere long to them may go ; 
— That glimpse of immortahty 

Is heaven begun below. 



EVENING TIME. 

Zech. xiv. 7. 



At evening time let there be light : — 
Life's little day draws near its close ; 

Around me fall the shades of night, 

The night of death, the grave's repose ; 
To crown my joys, to end my woes, 

At evening time let there be light. 

At evening time let there be light : — 
Stormy and dark hath been my day ; 

Yet rose the mom benignly bright, 

Dews, birds, and flowers cheer'd all the way 
Oh for one sweet, one parting ray ! 

At evening time let there be light. 

At evening time there shall be Hght : — 
For God hath said, — " So let it be !" 

Fear, doubt, and anguish, take their flight, 
His glory now is risen on me ; 
Mine eyes shall his salvation see : 

— 'Tis evening time, and there is light. 

Conway, JTorth Hales, 1828. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



THE LOT OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 

" We know that all things work together for good to them that love God." 

Rom. viii. 28, 

Yea, — " ALL things work together for their good .'" 

How can this glorious truth be understood ? 

'Tis like Jehovah's throne, where marvellous light 

Hides in thick darkness from created sight : 

The first-born seraph, trembhrig while he sings, 

Views its veil'd lustre through his shadowing wings ; 

Or, if he meets, by unexpected grace, 

The beatific vision, face to face. 

Shrinks from perfection which no eye can see. 

Entranced in the abyss of Deity. 

Yea, — "ALL things work together for their good!" 
How shall the mystery be understood ? 

From man's primeval curse are these set free, 
Sin slain, death swallow'd up in victory ? 
The body from corruption so refined, 
'Tis but the immortal vesture of the mind ? 
The mind from folly so to wisdom won, 
'Tis a pure sunbeam of the eternal sun ? 

Ah ! no, no ; — all that troubles life is theirs, 
Hard toil, sharp suffering, slow-consuming cares ; 
To mourn and weep ; want raiment, food, and rest, 
Brood o'er the unutter'd anguish of the breast ; 
To love, to hope, desire, possess, in vain ; 
Wrestle with weakness, weariness, and pain, 
Struggle with fell disease from breath to breath. 
And every moment die a moment's death. 

This is their portion, this the common lot ; 
But they have sorrows which the world knows not : 
— Their conflicts with that world, its fair, false joys. 
Ensnaring riches and delusive toys, \ 
Its love, its hatred ; its neglect and scorn ; 
With self-abhorrence harder to be borne ; 



THE LOT OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 



The pangs of conscience, when God's holy law, 

Through Sinai's thunders, strikes them dumb with awe ; 

Passions disorder'd, when insane desires 

Blow the rank embers of unhallow'd fires ; 

Evils that lurk in ambush at the heart, 

And shoot their arrows thence through every part ; 

Harsh roots of bitterness, light seeds of sin. 

Oft springing up, and stirring strife within ; 

Pride, like the serpent, vaunting to deceive, 

As with his subtilty beguiling Eve ; 

Ambition, hke the great red dragon, hurl'd, 

Sheer from heaven's battlements to this low world, 

Boundless in rage, as limited in power, 

Ramping abroad, and roaring to devour: 

— These, which blithe worldlings laugh at and contemn, 

Are worse than famine, sword, and fire to them. 

Nor these alone, for neither few nor small 
The trials rising from their holy call : 
— The Spirit's searching, proving, cleansing flames ; 
Duty's demands, the Gospel's sovereign claims ; 
Stern self-denial counting all things loss 
For Christ, and daily taking up the cross ; 
The broken heart, or heart that will not break. 
That aches not, or that cannot cease to ache ; 
Doubts and misgivings, lest when storms are past. 
They make sad shipwreck of the faith at last : 
— These, and a thousand forms of fear and shame, 
Bosom-temptations, that have not a name. 
But have a nature, felt through flesh and bone, 
Through soul and spirit, — felt by them alone ; 
— These, these the Christian pilgrims sore distress. 
Like thorns and briers of the wilderness ; 
These keep them humble, keep them in the path, 
As those that flee from everlasting wrath. 

Yet, while their hearts and hopes are fix'd above, 
As those who lefti on everlasting love. 
On faithfulness, which, though heaven's pillars bend. 
And earth's base fail, uphold them to the end ; — 



By them, by them alone 'tis understood, 
How all things work together for their good. 
Would'st THOU too understand ? — behold I show 
The perfect way, — Love God, and thou shall know. 



A BENEDICTION FOR A BABY. 

What blessing shall I ask for thee, 

In the sweet dawn of infancy ? 

— That, which our Saviour, at his birth. 

Brought down with Him from heaven to earth. 

What next, in childhood's April years 
Of sunbeam smiles and rainbow tears ? 
— That, which in Him all eyes might trace, 
To grow in wisdom and in grace. 

What in the Avay ward path of youth, 
Where falsehood walks abroad as truth ? 
— By that good Spirit to be led. 
Which John saw resting on his head. 

What, in temptation's wilderness, 
When wants assail, and fears oppress ? 
— To wield like Him the Scripture-sword, 
And vanquish Satan by " the word." 

What, in the labour, pain, and strife, 
Combats and cares of daily life ? 
— In his cross-bearing steps to tread. 
Who had not where to lay his head. 

What, in the agony of heart, 
When foes rush in, and friends depart ? 
— To pray like Him, the Holy One, 
"Father, thy will, not mine, be done." 

What, in the bitterness of death. 
When the last sigh cuts the last breath ? 



EVENING SONG. 467 



— Like Him your spirit to commend, 
And up to paradise ascend. 

What in the grave, and in that hour, 
When even the grave shall lose its power ? 
— Like Him, your rest awhile to take ; 
Then at the trumpet's sound awake, 
Him as He is in heaven to see, 
And as He is, yourself to be. 



1831. 



EVENING SONG. 

FOR THE SABBATH DAY. 



Millions within thy courts have met. 
Millions this day before thee bow'd ; 

Their faces Zion-ward were set. 

Vows with their lips to thee they vow'd : 

But Thou, soul-searching God ! hast known 
The hearts of all that bent the knee. 

And hast accepted those alone, 

In spirit and truth that worshipp'd Thee. 

People of many a tribe and tongue. 

Men of strange colours, climates, lands. 
Have heard thy truth, thy glory sung, 

And ofTer'd prayer with holy hands. 
Still, as the light of morning broke 

O'er island, continent, or deep. 
Thy far-spread family awoke. 

Sabbath all round the world to keep. 

From east to west, the sun survey 'd. 
From north to south, adoring throngs ; 

And still, Avhere evening stretch'd her shade, 
The stars came forth to hear their songs. 

Harmonious as the winds and seas, 

In halcyon hours, when storms are flown, 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. 



Arose earth's Babel languages, 
In pure accordance to thy throne. 

Not angel-trumpets sound more clear, 
Not elders' harps, nor seraphs' lays, 

Yield sweeter music to thine ear 

Than humble prayer and thankful praise. 

And not a prayer, a tear, a sigh, 

Hath fail'd this day some suit to gain : 

— To those in trouble Thou wert nigh ; 
Not one hath sought thy face in vain. 

Thy poor were bountifully fed, 

Thy chasten'd sons have kiss'd the rod. 
Thy mourners have been comforted. 

The pure in heart have seen their God. 

Yet one prayer more ; — and be it one, 
In which both heaven and earth accord ; 

— Fulfil thy promise to thy Son, 
Let all that breathe call Jesus Lord ! 



A WEDDING WISH. 

TO MR. AND MRS. H. 

The cynosure of midnight skies 

Appears but one to seamen's eyes, 

Yet twain there are. 

And each a star, 

Perhaps a sun : — 

May you, my Friends, reverse the view. 

And while on earth you look like Two, 

From heaven be seen as One ; 

Yea, like that polar symbol be 

A double star of constancy.* 



• The polar star, seen through a powerful telescope, appears to be two, very 
near together. 



NOTES TO VOL. II. 



MISCELLANEOUS POEMS, 

Page 293. 

1 In November, 1825, when many of my friends and neighbours 
honoured me with a pubhc entertainment, on retiring from my long labours 
among them, as owner and editor of a local Journal, (sec the general 
Preface to these Volumes,') there were others, especially ladies, who 
could not conveniently join in the festivities of a dinner-table, but who 
wished to show me some token of kindness on the occasion. By these, 
a few weeks afterwards, I was presented with a handsome silver ink- 
stand, of home manufacture, for myself, and two hundred sovereigns to- 
wards the expense of renewing a Christian mission by the United Bre- 
thren (or Moravians) in the West Indian Island of Tobago, which had 
been begun by my parents in the year 1789. The troubles of the 
French Revolution soon afterwards having reached that colony, the 
work was abandoned in the following year, and my father was com- 
pelled to take refuge in Barbadoes, where he had been previously sta- 
tioned as a minister of the gospel of peace to the Negro slaves. Before 
his flight, my mother had been released from sharing his toils and suf- 
ferings on earth, and her bereaved partner had deposited her remains, 
to wait the resurrection of the just, in the little garden attached to their 
temporary habitation, there being no Protestant place for interment in 
the island : — thus taking possession, though " hoping against hope," of 
the land where he had sojourned with her as a stranger for a few 
months only ; — like the Patriarch Abraham, when he bought the cave 
of Machpelah from the children of Heth, to bury his Sarah in, and by 
that earnest of his contract secure the promised Canaan to his porterity 
through many generations, when he had as yet " none inheritance in 
it ; no, not so much as to set his foot on." 

During the war with England which ensued, Tobago fell into the 
hands of our countrymen, and has been held ever since by the British 
Crown. My father, soon after his return to Barbadoes, entered into his 
rest ; and for thirty-five years following, the station in the former island, 

40 469 



NOTES TO VOL. 11. 



where he had broken ground only, remained unoccupied for the pur- 
pose to which it had been consecrated. But Mr. Hamilton, the gentle- 
man at whose invitation, and under whose direct patronage, the experi- 
ment of the mission on his estate had been undertaken by my parents, 
never to the end of his own life lost sight of that object ; and at his 
death he bequeathed -a considerable legacy for its promotion, should 
the Brethren at a future period be emboldened to resume their evan- 
gelical labours there. What the sum left by Mr. Hamilton might be> 
I cannot now recollect, but I have been informed, that it was so well 
administered by his representatives, that, when the mission was re-com- 
menccd on the reserved spot, that fund amounted to a thousand pounds. 
To this my benefactors added the two hundred pounds, which they had 
raised to gratify me by a proof of their esteem, the most humbling and 
yet the most exalting that could be devised, — namely, by stipulating 
that their bounty should be appropriated to that sacred service, in which 
both my parents had laid down their lives ; accompanied by an earnest 
request, that the settlement, about to be formed in the field of their last 
labours, should be called by the name which they bore. This was 
readily granted by the authorities of the Brethren's Church, the El- 
der's conference at Herrnhut, in Germany, who direct the ecclesiastical 
affairs of the body, at home and abroad, from synod to synod. The 
mission thus revived in 1825 has gradually increased; and, under the 
name of " Montgomery," with the blessing of God upon the preachiiig 
of the Gospel by his servants there, may it perpetuate, to the end of 
time, the memory of those sainted relatives who left that name to me ! 
October 12, 1840. 

Page 320. 

2 Henry Cornelius Agrippa, of Nettesheim, counsellor to Charles V. 
Emperor of Germany, — the author of " Occult Philosophy," and other 
profound works, — is said to have shown to the Earl of Surrey the image 
of his mistress Geraldine in a magical mirror. 

Page 415. 

3 This anticipation has been accomplished. The adjacent plantation 
has rapidly grown up ; the ground has been beautifully laid out ; and, 
in 1835, a conspicuous monument was erected, by public subscription, 
on the spot where three hundred and thirty-nine bodies, out of upwards 
of four hundred victin^s of the cholera, were interred, — to commemorate 
the said removal of the sufferers from among the hving, and their 
strange insulation after death, within that humble enclosure. The 
shaft is triangular, diminishing in stories from the base to the summit, 
which was originally surmounted by a plain cross of proportionate ele- 



NOTES TO VOL. II. 



vation. Unfortunately, in the hurricane of January the 7th, 1839, one 
third of the whole was thrown down. It has subsequently been re- 
paired, and crowned with a less graceful form of cross, by which, how- 
ever, the tapering structure will be less liable to injury from elemental 
violence. 

The two following Sonnets were composed on visiting the scene of 
dilapidation, in February of the same year. 

I. 

Thou tempest-broken column ! still stand on ; 
More fit memorial of the untimely dead, 
Than when the cross upon thy summit shed 
A halo round this Golgotha ; — 'tis gone. 
And now the earnest eye, where late it shone, 
Is rapt through vague infinity instead. 
Up the blue sky, receding over head. 
Less and less seen the longer look'd upon. 

Thus, where the fragments of thy pinnacle 
Lie at thy base, as lie within this plot 
The bones of buried mortals, — while I dwell 
On where and what may be the spirit's lot. 
Thought falls like night on my bewilder'd mind, — 
The more I search the more I feel I'm blind. 



Yet there is Hope, thou storm-struck monument ! 
Stand on, though half thy glory be laid low 
By an unseen and instantaneous blow : 
For, as the wind, which thee asunder rent. 
Came none knew whence, and none knew whither went, 
So the plague smote the slain around thee, — so 
Surprised its victims ; and, with Wo ! ivo ! wo ! 
Hundreds, unwarn'd, to sudden judgment sent. 

Not for the dead, ye living ! but the unborn, 
let the symbol of redeeming Love 
Again this renovated shaft adorn. 
And point from death below to life above, 
That all, who here sin's bitter wages see. 
May on this mount remember Calvary ! 



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